Where He Really Lives Aside, Sen. Pat Roberts Has Moved to His Right (Yup! Election year!)

rollcall.com ^ | 2/10/14 | David Hawkings

[cotton1706]

Sen. Pat Roberts might be in additional re-election trouble, thanks to a weekend story in The New York Times that’s generating buzz about how the Republican doesn’t have a home he can call his own in Kansas — but he does have a new case to make about his conservative credentials.

After 16 years in the Senate (and as many years before that in the House) cementing a reputation as an establishment Republican, one driven much less by ideology than by a desire for accomplishment, Roberts tacked hard to the right last year. In fact, among the six members of the Senate Republican Conference facing viable primary challenges, Roberts was unique in this regard: He opposed President Barack Obama much more often than before and also stuck with his party significantly more than he usually does.

The CQ Roll Call vote studies for 2013 found that Roberts voted against the president’s wishes 66 percent of the time, 6 points higher than the Senate GOP average. During Obama’s first term, the senator’s presidential opposition averaged 55 percent.

At the same time, Roberts toed the party line on 99 percent of the votes in which most Republicans voted the opposite way from most Democrats. That nearly perfect measure of loyalty was 13 points higher than the average Senate GOP party unity mark; it also was 8 points higher than Roberts’ average for the first four years of his current term.

[demshateGod]

Looking forward to voting against this guy. Maybe I should register R.

[Paine in the Neck]

Roberts is trying to work the Hatch/McCain gambit - 5 years of acting like a statist followed by one year of talking like a conservative. It worked for Hatch and McCain but, hopefully, enough people are onto the scam now.

Support Dr. Milton Wolf to oust Pat Roberts in KS

[SharpRightTurn]

The 6th year Republican squish metamorphosis.

[Din Maker]

Surely the folks in Kansas will see this as nothing but an opportunistic attempt to fool them. If he wins the election this time, he will be too old to run again next time and knowing that he will not have to face the voters again.....Katie bar the door.