60 Senate seats, neuter Greg later.

Its smart move on Obama’s part and just think of the harm they would do for 2 years with 60 seats. Just think and then start running

I didn’t do it because Moe remonstrated me once for posting a diary that could be seen as contravening the purposes of this forum. Discretion being the better part of valor I didn’t write it. I will, however, respond here.

Being in the minority sucks. Being in the minority representing a state that has been trending hard the other way, thus forced to fight like hell to hold your seat, sucks worse. There’s been some noise that Lynch might actually pick a moderate Republican to fill the seat. Perhaps Gregg has been, or could be, given assurances that this will be the case. Regardless, Commerce might be a more interesting job for Gregg than being a Senator in the minority under the circumstances. Sununu lost his seat in ’08 and McCain didn’t do well in NH either. Gregg will have to spend the next two years doing everything humanly possible in order to hold his seat. Maybe he doesn’t fancy that.

Maybe President Obama will offer him the chance to be the “sane man” in the room? I’m not advocating that he do so, of course. I just find the situation rather interesting. I was told by several conservative friends of mine that I was dreaming when I told them I expected Obama to place several Republicans in his cabinet. I was also told I was dreaming (by at least one RedStater) for believing that Obama would make any effort at all to lower ANYONE’S taxes.

Welcome to interesting times.

I understand NH is trending blue; many MA voters moved up there for no property taxes and kept their liberal politics and state Dems have registered all college kids from neighboring states but he is still favored to win.

Lynch has said he won’t challenge him and I don’t see either of 2 congress people beating him and besides in off year elections they favor the party out of power so I don’t get why he would do this to NH Republican Party either.

He should of shot this down and used to his advantage in that Obama wanted to have him work for him.

Then for a lot of Americans, he will be seen more as Judas Gregg.

Democrats couldn’t win a Senate supermajority at the ballot boxes, so they are trying to steal it here (and in Minnesota) to create their virtual dictatorship.

It’s what I’d do; let Obama waste time considering.

Something tells me we’re not that lucky, though.

An Obama administration official says that Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire is the leading candidate to become commerce secretary.

The official says that an announcement of Gregg’s nomination could come as soon as Monday. The official spoke Saturday on condition of anonymity because the official wasn’t authorized to discuss administration deliberations.

What the hell is Judas doing to his Party?

Lets say even if the Gov names a Republican to fill the seat its a worrisome for us. The NH Republican Party does not have many leaders right now.

I am not sure a Sununu could win a seat in 2 years?

Wtih all due respect to the Senator from NH, I hope he doesn’t think that he’s being considered for his talents or skills….. this move is fairly transparent on BO’s part, and has nothing to do with finding a good Secretary of Commerce. Obama wants to completely eliminate the chance of successful filibusters in the Senate, period.

The larger question is that given the stakes involved—i.e., losing the last real chance that conservatives have to block a massive expansion of government–why is Senator Gregg even considering this? Selling out for thirty pieces of silver—or in this case, the stature of a Cabinet position, good travel perks, etc.–would be the ultimate knife in the back to a Republican party which has supported his political career. And should he indeed accept the post, he’ll be tossed aside like a used dishrag once a Democrat Senator from NH is sworn in…..he most likely won’t even be invited to Cabinet meetings.

In the meantime, it was about at a similar point in the early days of the Clinton administration that Richard Shelby—realizing that what the President was offering was not what he had advertised as a candidate–changed parties and became a Republican. It was obviously a principled move, and shows that not everyone just HAS to be in the majority (yeah, like you, Joe Lieberman). Makes you wonder if we could pick off a member from the other side of the aisle–Ben Nelson, Mark Pryor, or some other right-of-center Senator.

Can anyone tell me why a Republican senator would take a job with a Dem admin that is at best temporary? If, the unlikely happens, and Obama is re-elected in 2012 and Gregg is commerce secretary, where does he go from there? I really don’t think this admin will be in any position to get through 2012 to be reelected. There have been too many issues with his nominees, I can’t wait to see what happens during confirmation process. Two tax cheats, an attorney genera that promotes FALN pardons, This entire admin makes me sick.

Obama is doing this to get the senate seat to a dem.

In MA in 2004 they changed law from Gov. appt to special election because they expected Kerry to win and Mitt Romney was governor and knew he’d appt a republican. When they thought Kerry would get a job in the Obama admin, there was talk of changing back to Gov appointee, because Deval Patrick is Gov now.

We should mobilize and demand that all senate seats that are vacated for unecpted reasons, in every state, are special elections.