Beware of Snarlin' Arlen

Scott J. Ferrell, Congressional Quarterly / Getty Images My battles—on the phone! in the locker room!—with the most hot-headed, opportunistic, and unpredictably bizarre member of the United States Senate.

It was a double-barreled phone call from the office of Arlen Specter, the zealously contrary senator who is now, happily for some in Washington, the Democrats’ problem. Two of Specter’s senior staffers were ready to read me the riot act. But they didn’t sound angry; they sounded nervous.

“Senator Specter asked us to call you,” the communications director began, his voice quavering. “Our press secretary is also on the line. And the senator has asked us to tape this call so we can play it back for him later.”

Just below the surface, Specter has a simmering rage that occasionally manifests itself in brutal abuse of underlings. It’s not for nothing that he’s called Snarlin’ Arlen.

Now this was a novel experience—having my phone calls monitored, ex post facto, by a livid legislator. For a second, I wondered if Specter himself was on the line, covering the mouthpiece with his hand. “The senator has asked us to inform you that your story was indefensible,” the communications director continued, “and the senator wants you to know that he will never speak to you again.”

“Well, I’m sorry he feels that way,” I managed to say in my surprise.

I was in The Washington Post’s makeshift workspace during the 2000 Republican National Convention in Specter’s hometown of Philadelphia, which was busy nominating George W. Bush. I’d guessed that the married, then-70-year-old senator would be annoyed by that morning’s gossip item, which described his flirtation with a tall blond real-estate broker from Houston during a fundraising brunch at his home. (“She’s gorgeous,” Specter had told me before crooning a love song of sorts to her, a creaky version of “Don’t Fence Me In.” “I think he’s cute,” the lady in question confided.) But I never imagined that my story would push him over the edge. The next day, the senator was front and center in The Philadelphia Inquirer, calling me a liar. "He barges in, uninvited, and writes fiction," Specter seethed.

All of which is brought to mind as I digest the slow-motion train wreck of Specter’s emergency conversion to the Democratic Party to save himself from a career-ending primary during next year’s reelection campaign in Pennsylvania.

All the elements of his long tenure as a public official are on display—many of them admirable, others not. There’s his cussed independence and political courage (discounting the enmity of his fellow Republicans in order to vote against Robert Bork during the Reagan administration and, more recently, to support President Barack Obama’s stimulus package). There’s his almost Churchillian attitude of “never give in”—a life-affirming toughness that allowed him to overcome bouts of lymphoma and brain cancer, giving hope to others confronting grave diseases.

And then, less attractively, there’s his brazenly calculating opportunism that consistently has placed his narrow self-interests over every other consideration, prompting columnist David Broder to write the other day that “he will stick with you only as long as it serves his own interests—and not a day longer.” Add to that an insatiable vanity that, by most accounts, has driven him to get more than one facelift, a deep desire for flattery (not, by any means, unique among senators), and the need to be treated like a raja. (“Where are your bearers?” fellow Sen. Joe Biden teased when they met on the track at Union Station.) And, just below the surface, a simmering rage that occasionally manifests itself in brutal abuse of underlings. Why so mad? I wouldn’t presume to psychoanalyze the man, but it’s not for nothing that he’s called Snarlin’ Arlen.

The latest news is that Specter and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid are having a not-so-polite dispute about whether Reid promised him that his 29 years of Republican seniority will be transferable across the aisle. Reid says not so fast—the issue won’t be decided until after the 2010 midterms. Specter claims Reid is reneging on their deal—and that retaining his committee status and thus bumping senior Democrats is not a reward for good behavior, “that’s an entitlement!”—or so he blustered last Sunday on Meet The Press.