Goodbye Arlen

It looks like Arlen Specter will go the way of Bob Bennett and Alan Mollohan, another long-time incumbent who will find himself on the outs with the voters:

After months of holding double-digit leads in polls, Specter is now telling voters that he is "running scared." Sestak, 58, has poured more than $1.5 million into a two-week advertising buy touting his background as a former Navy vice admiral, raising his profile and allowing him to pull closer to the incumbent. He then aired a negative ad showing then-President George W. Bush holding Specter's hand and telling a Republican audience that "I can count on this man," just before Specter's narrow 2004 victory in the GOP primary against former congressman Patrick Toomey.

Now, some polls show Sestak as a slight favorite to face Toomey, who is unopposed for the GOP nomination. Specter has turned to President Obama to help blunt Sestak's momentum with radio and TV ads. Vice President Biden, who regularly rode Amtrak with Specter as they commuted to Philadelphia and Wilmington, Del., as Senate colleagues, has made campaign appearances on his behalf.

'A principled matter'

But Specter has found a leery reception from Democratic voters. In each stump speech Saturday as he traveled through western Pennsylvania, he began by recalling his move across the aisle a year ago, a switch that Democrats in Washington hailed as setting the party on a path to claim a 60-seat filibuster-proof majority. Since the move, Specter has been steadfast in siding with the party on key legislation and nominations, but his standing at home has slid, along with the political prospects for Democrats nationwide.

Specter is now trying to recast the contest as a referendum on an act of courage.

"It is very tough in the Republican Party today," he told a group of gay activists, linking his plight to those of Sen. Robert F. Bennett (R-Utah), who lost his renomination bid over the weekend, and Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who left the GOP to run as an independent for a Senate seat.

"It was also a principled matter to be able to support President Obama," Specter said, citing the stimulus vote he cast while still a Republican and his vote for health-care legislation. Saying he had returned to "the party of my roots," he said he moved to the GOP in the mid-1960s only after Democrats would not allow him the nomination for Philadelphia district attorney.

After all those party switches Specter is still having problems figuring out what party he's a member of:

The first time Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) slipped up here Tuesday night at the Allegheny County Democratic Committee’s Jefferson-Jackson Dinner, most in the audience pretended not to notice.

But at the end of his remarks when Specter again thanked the “the Allegheny County Republicans” for their endorsement, many couldn’t help but laugh nervously and shoot did-he-really-just-say-that looks at each other.

Specter's demise may end up being based on age as much as politics. Voters rejected age (and experience) for youth in 2008, and after all those years in Congress why would Pennsylvanians get excited about sending an 80-year old back for another 6-year term?