Bob Bennett’s Loss Signals GOP Move To Far Right

Utah Senator Bob Bennett, a reliable conservative vote on almost every issue was, nevertheless, defeated in his attempt to be nominated by his party to seek a fourth Senate term. Bennett has an 84% rating from the American Conservative Union, and a 98% rating from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, but is apparently too liberal for his ever-right-leaning party.

Bennett’s critics cited his vote for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) as well as his seat on the Senate Appropriations Committee — both symbols, conservatives said, of his lack of commitment to shrinking the size of government.

While state Republicans had expressed uneasiness with Bennett, it was the DC-based Club for Growth that helped crystallize that opposition. The Club spent more than $200,000 on a combination of television ads, direct mail pieces and phone calls designed to influence the 3,500 (or so) delegates who attended Saturday’s state convention.

The Salt Lake Tribune further examines the problems the far-right has with Bennett.

He’s been vilified for his support of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, the Bush administration’s Wall Street-bailout bill. But leading economists agree that without hasty federal intervention the economy could have collapsed, and the Great Recession would have turned into a deep depression.

Plus, Bennett has been called on the carpet for proposing an innovative market-driven, bipartisan health care plan that would have abandoned the failed employer-based insuranceQuantcast system and reduced health care costs. He’s been criticized for utilizing budget earmarks to assure that Utahns receive a fair return on their tax dollars.

Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, George H. W. Bush and, yes Ronald Reagan, who cut and run from Lebanon, would be considered liberals according to today’s Republican party.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.