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Senate GOP Help Alaska Party Switcher

By Online Friday, September 24, 2010

You’re not going to believe what happened this week. Just when I thought Republicans in Washington were beginning to get the message, they went back to business as usual.

As you know, Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski lost the Republican primary to her conservative challenger, Joe Miller, in a fair fight. But instead of graciously conceding and endorsing the Republican nominee, Murkowski announced that she will continue her campaign as an independent write-in candidate.

Senate Republicans held a closed-door meeting Wednesday afternoon to elect someone to replace Senator Murkowski as the top Republican on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Or so we thought.

Rather than taking away Murkowski’s leadership position on the committee, Senate Republicans decided to let her keep it. One senator after another stood up to argue in favor of protecting her place on the committee — a position she will no doubt use in her campaign against Joe Miller, the conservative Republican nominee.

Help SCF Stop the Alaska RINO
It was bad enough to watch my colleagues work to support her in the primary after she had built a record of betraying conservatives principles. But watching them back her after she left the party and launched a campaign against the Republican nominee was more than I could bear.

I spoke out against the motion and I voted against it. But the good ol’ boys’ club, which always protects its own, prevailed. The motion was adopted by secret ballot and the final tally was not disclosed.

Keep in mind that I was attacked just last week by the Washington establishment for supporting Christine O’Donnell — a conservative — because they believe her nomination will hand the seat to a Democrat in Delaware. This week, however, that same establishment voted to help Lisa Murkowski — a moderate — defeat the Republican nominee, which could hand the seat to a Democrat in Alaska.

Marc Thiessen addressed this double standard in a column he wrote for the Washington Post on Tuesday, which you can read here. Here’s an excerpt:

In that sense of entitlement, Murkowski is not alone. All last week, we heard the GOP establishment complain how the Tea Party is threatening Republican unity by pursuing “ideological purityâ€