Too Clever By Half?

As Gomer Pyle would have said, "Sur-PRISE, sur-PRISE, sur-PRISE!" The Senate Democrats have placed Arlen Specter on what amounts to probation, consigning him to the lowest seniority slots on his committee assignments. They say the issue of his seniority will be "negotiated" after the 2010 elections. Translation: be a good boy, Arlen, or else. So he may have saved his Senate career, but at the price of being reduced, in effect, to freshman status. And, indeed, it is not even clear he will be around to do any negotiating in 2011. Was it a coincidence that, on the same day the Senate was gelding Specter, SEIU em>capo de tutti cappi Andy Stern was meeting with Pennsylvania Dem Rep. Joe Sestak (who is interested in running for Specter's seat), and told ABC <that it would be "hard to imagine" his union or any other supporting Specter next year if he continues to oppose card check? Is it all that hard to wonder if, in the darkness of his bedroom, late at night, Specter questions just what, exactly, he got out of this whole deal?