Exclusive: Rep. Parker Griffith switches to GOP

[Renae]

Exclusive: Rep. Parker Griffith switches to GOP - - POLITICO.com

POLITICO has learned that Rep. Parker Griffith, a freshman Democrat from Alabama, will announce today that he’s switching parties to become a Republican.

According to two senior GOP aides familiar with the decision, the announcement will take place this afternoon in Griffith's district in northern Alabama.

Griffith’s party switch comes on the eve of a pivotal congressional health care vote and will send a jolt through a Democratic House Caucus that has already been unnerved by the recent retirements of a handful of members who, like Griffith, hail from districts that offer prime pickup opportunities for the GOP in 2010.

The switch represents a coup for the House Republican leadership, which had been courting Griffith since he publicly criticized the Democratic leadership in the wake of raucous town halls during the summer.

Griffith, who captured the seat in a close 2008 open seat contest, will become the first Republican to hold the historically Democratic, Huntsville-based district. A radiation oncologist who founded a cancer treatment center, Griffith plans to blast the Democratic health care bill as a prime reason for his decision to switch parties—and is expected to cite his medical background as his authority on the subject.

Good for him!

 

[zimmer]

Exclusive: Rep. Parker Griffith switches to GOP - - POLITICO.com


Good for him!

Welcome Rep. Parker, and give 'em hell.
They deserve it.

.

 

[randel]

Welcome Rep. Parker, and give 'em hell.
They deserve it.

.

not exactly a shock...his district is heavily republican which mccain won hands down last november

 

[Captain America]

I have long thought that politicians should represent the desires of their constituants that elected them. This concept escapes Lieberman but I digress. :roll:

Time will tell if Griffith's move backfires on him.

 

[Missouri Mule]

The biggest skunk at the party was the turncoat Spector who guaranteed this benighted health care takeover. That man has not one scruple in his bones. The Republican establishment backed him and then he turned around and stabbed them in the back.

This defection by this lone representative will be a mere blip on the pond and quickly forgotten. Next November we'll see if the people want totalitarianism or Democracy. If they want Democracy, the "Democrats" will be tossed out of office by the dozens as they should be. Obviously few of them have ever bothered to read the Constitution. All they care about is power and the power they wield over the peons out in the boondocks.

 

[zimmer]

not exactly a shock...his district is heavily republican which mccain won hands down last november

Sorry. Try again.

Griffith, who captured the seat in a close 2008 open seat contest, will become the first Republican to hold the historically Democratic, Huntsville-based district.

Is "Centrist" code for Liberal Democrat?
Just curious.
What makes you a centrist?

.

 

[randel]

Sorry. Try again.


Is "Centrist" code for Liberal Democrat?
Just curious.
What makes you a centrist?

.

i will make a small correction...it went republican by 23pts for mccain last election.



CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time - Blogs from CNN.com

 

[zimmer]

i will make a small correction...it went republican by 23pts for mccain last election.



CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time - Blogs from CNN.com

Perhaps, but...

Democrats, however, still hold most offices at the local level, as well as most of the district's seats in the Alabama state legislature. Also, the district is one of only a few in the former Confederacy that has not elected a Republican to the U.S. Congress since Reconstruction. In the mid-1990s it was a seriously contested seat, with longtime incumbent Bud Cramer (D) winning by a narrow 50% vote in 1994. Since then, however, Cramer has taken over 70% of the vote in every election since 1998 and even ran unopposed in the Democratic landslide year of 2006.

That's a 108-year Democrat stranglehold on that seat.
Not bad.

.

 

[Orion]

Switching parties should be against the law. His constituents voted for a democrat, not a republican. If he wants to switch he should wait until the next election.

 

[zimmer]

Switching parties should be against the law. His constituents voted for a democrat, not a republican. If he wants to switch he should wait until the next election.

Disagree.

They voted for a man that lost faith in his party. Bottom line is his votes on this would have been with the R's, and obviously he feels the party doesn't represent him anymore.

He's being honest, just as Specter and Jump'in Jim were...

It's why R's should stop courting the likes of Specter, and Jump'in Jim... Snow Job and what's her name... the other dimwit from the NE... Collins.

.

 

[Oftencold]

I don't really approve of representatives changing parties during their terms. I think that the more ethical choice would be to become non-affiliated, then run on a new party ticket in a future election.

 

[Joe1991]

While I'm suspicious of any politician who switches parties, I think they should only be able to do so at election time.

Such a big jump in beliefs and principles probably means they didn't have any to begin with.

 

[Gibberish]

Switching parties should be against the law. His constituents voted for a democrat, not a republican. If he wants to switch he should wait until the next election.

Why allow him to masquerade around with a Democrat title while making decisions as a Republican? I do think that some sort of review of his position should occur though. The people voted for a Democrat and this elected official possibly mislead and lied to the people.

He is choosing to take a chance of not being re-elected by changing to Republican in a Democratic district.

 

[zimmer]

I don't really approve of representatives changing parties during their terms. I think that the more ethical choice would be to become non-affiliated, then run on a new party ticket in a future election.

Honesty is ethical... I like the political fall-out aspect... it hurts dems more than R's... as we know who our demons are and wish they'd go away... put us out of our misery, and finish their political careers.

 

[Dav]

Such a big jump in beliefs and principles probably means they didn't have any to begin with.

Why is changing parties the same as changing beliefs and principles?

From the looks of it this guy mostly voted with the Republicans as it was, might as well call a duck a duck.

 

[zimmer]

While I'm suspicious of any politician who switches parties, I think they should only be able to do so at election time.

Such a big jump in beliefs and principles probably means they didn't have any to begin with.

No, not necessarily.

For example:

When you have a president claiming to be post-partisan, post-racial, a complainer about spending and then behaves contradictory to those statements, and his lunatics in his party encourage it...

A principled man has only one choice.

Fight... and abandon the rancid ship.

.

 

[randel]

Perhaps, but...


That's a 108-year Democrat stranglehold on that seat.
Not bad.

.

not bad, but ya gotta admit, 23pts is a significant margin of victory

 

[CriticalThought]

Nothing would make me happier if fiscal Democrats took over the GOP one seat at a time.

 

[zimmer]

not bad, but ya gotta admit, 23pts is a significant margin of victory

I agree, but 108 years at the local level... That's a Trivial Pursuit question.

I say we call it a draw.



.

 

[zimmer]

Nothing would make me happier if fiscal Democrats took over the GOP one seat at a time.

Nothing would make me happier than having Conservatives take over Blue Dog seats.

Look at where they got us?
Good tactic by the Dems though... send the rabid socialists in hiding and run blue dawgs.
Then after the election... put their balls in a vice and threaten to light 'em on fire.

Like Obama, it's a one-timer tactic after the bullsh*t they pulled in the last year.

They showed us... even the dumbest rock... what these people have "planned" for us.

.

 

[randel]

I agree, but 108 years at the local level... That's a Trivial Pursuit question.

I say we call it a draw.



.

fair enough

 

[Strucky]

Will this be the first of many rats abandoning a sinking ship?

 

[The Prof]

seen aside the recent retirements of eleven dem incumbents, seven of whom come from mccain districts, and taken in conjunction with the president's abysmal poll performances and those specifically questioning support of his issues, mr griffith's turn is part of a trend that has to be quite worrisome to blue leaders

it's much easier for the second and third to switch than the first

 

[Erod]

not exactly a shock...his district is heavily republican which mccain won hands down last november

Apparently you didn't read it. His district is historically Democratic.

 

[Erod]

While I'm suspicious of any politician who switches parties, I think they should only be able to do so at election time.

Such a big jump in beliefs and principles probably means they didn't have any to begin with.

Or maybe his principles mean so much to him that he won't tow the party line like others do, or allow himself to be Chicago'd into doing something against his will.