While the MSM hail Olympia Snowe as a principled “maverick” for being the only Republican on the Senate Finance Committee to break ranks and vote in favor of a health care takeover bill, Jim Antle of The American Spectator has a different take.
Antle argues that the “maverick” label should hardly apply to a senator who tends to fashion her votes in favor of those in the White House, be they Republican or Democrat:
It is an odd sort of maverick who demonstrates his independence by regularly voting with those who are in power. When moderate Republican senators saved the Obama administration’s stimulus plan, Ross Douthat, now a New York Times columnist, described their mentality well: “Take what the party in power wants, subtract as much money as you can without infuriating them, vote yes, and declare victory.”
And thus the media’s infatuation with rebel Republicans, and perpetual scorn for more independent-minded Democrats like Joe Lieberman and, several years back, Zell Miller, continues.
We shouldn’t be surprised.
Snowe is doubtless enjoying her day in the warm glow of the MSM’s approval, but she should take heed of John McCain’s fate. In the mind of the press, that media darling went from a fiercely independent statesman to the most dangerous politician in America in short order.
