The news of the day. Lotsa libs aren’t real happy about this, and I wouldn’t have expected them to be.

But the fact is Specter’s switch says a lot more about the Republican Party than it does the Dems.

It’s probably true, as RNC Chairman Michael Steele says, that Specter switched because “he knew that he was going to lose a Republican primary due to his left-wing voting record.”

But as Kos notes:

We’ve been systematically making the case since the election that the GOP is now a regional southern party. And what better way to strike home that point than to see a moderate northeastern Republican switch parties, complaining about his party’s swing to the far right? And it’s a trend that if fully played out, could net us one or two additional seats in Maine, where Sen. Olympia Snowe could be a legitimate Democrat. …

<snip>

So while I may not be cheering the substance of Specter’s switch today, I’m definitely going to enjoy the massive hit the Republican Party will be taking today. Indeed, it’s gotten that much easier to tell the story of a Republican Party so extreme, its losing ground everywhere outside the South.

Update: Because this is far too funny not to pass along:

Palin/Joe the Plumber 2012- do it wingnuts, I double dog dare you.