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Bill! Relentless, Specter Raring to Take Next Step He's After a 4Th Term and a Better Senate Post

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Bill! Relentless, Specter Raring to Take Next Step He's After a 4Th Term and a Better Senate Post bill! relentless, Specter raring to take next step He's after a 4th term and a better Senate post. By Tom infield phian in a state that loves to despise ' INQUIRER STAFF WRITER Philadelphia — Specter stands a Arlen Specter always wanted it good chance of achieving in 1998 the most. • what no Pennsylvania senator has "That's right, that's right," he says ever achieved. with a mouthful of ham-and-cheese That is to be elected four times. sandwich. "Wanted it the most, and "John Heinz was elected three was willing to work the hardest." times," he says, referring to his He says this from the leather- friend and fellow Republican, killed cushioned backseat of a Lincoln in a 1991 air crash. Town Car rolling through Doyles- "Hugh Scott was elected three town on a recent, frenetic day of times," he says, naming one of "three campaign stops in Bucks County. wise men" among Republican sena- Now in his 17th year in the U.S. tors who went to President Richard Senate, Arlen Specter wants it again. Nixon amid the Watergate scandal in Always a bit of an outsider in state 1974 and urged him to resign. politics — a moderate Republican in "But that's it," Specter says. "No a right-leaninra party, a Philadel- See S EMIR on A24 t_ . 1-4 FG-- 6 eci C, tqc17 Pk(Z. 41 oisr PA- SPECTER from Al Clarence Thomas. one four times." Despite an abortive run for presi- The same determination that dent in '96, Specter is probably best drove Specter not to quit politics af- known for his questioning of Anita ter three straight election failures Hill — the Oklahoma law professor nearly a generation ago appears to who accused Thomas of sexually ha- drive him still. rassing her when she worked for Twenty months before his next him as an aide. election date, Specter is off and run- The toughness of the questions - ning — relentless as ever on the at one point, the former Philadel- brink of his 67th birthday, fully re- phia district attorney accused Hill covered, he says, from a noncancer- of perjury — stirred outrage among ous brain tumor that had to be ex- women who, Specter realized later, cised over the summer. imagined themselves in her posi- Already the most powerful Key- tion. stone State senator since Scott, two "I came within an eyelash — 2.6 decades ago, Specter is chairman of percent, exactly — of losing my the Veterans Affairs Committee, seat," he recalled. overseeing a Senate probe into the But that was five years ago. Anita Pentagon's handling of gulf war Hill is behind him. syndrome, the medical condition re- Or so he hopes. ported by some war veterans. Which is why he took great inter- As a four-term senator, he would est when, at Central Bucks West be in line to become chairman of High School in Doylestown, a stu- perhaps the most important Senate dent inquired about the "political panel: the Appropriations Commit- fallout" of the Thomas hearings. tee. "How many of you have heard of But he would have to get elected Justice Thomas?" he asked 75 stu- again for that. And for Specter, get- dents gathered in a double class- ting elected has often been a strug- room to hear him speak. gle. About 40 percent raised a hand. "It's never been easy for him," "How many of you have heard of said Ed Howard, a former GOP state Professor Hill?" senator from Bucks County and All but one or two raised a hand. longtime friend of Specter's. "I don't Later, in the Town Car, Specter re- think he expects it will be this time, flected on his poll. either." "What do I make of it? ... That Specter himself wistfully brought [even thoughl Justice Thomas is on up the names of two former sena- the Supreme Court, she remains a tors from Mississippi — John Sten- more dominant public figure." nis and James Eastland — who • wed in Washington for 41 and 36 Six days after taking questions yeais, respectively, while rarely from the students at C.B. West, Spec- basking to fight a battle back home. ter is making inquiries of his own —Stennis and Eastland," he said, in a dark-wood hearing chamber in "had the job for life." the modernist Hart Senate Office Though he'll surely face a well- Building. funded Democrat — and though he Besides heading the veterans may even get a conservative chal- panel, Specter is chairman of the lenge from within his party — Spec- subcommittee of the Senate Appro- ter looks a good bet to win, But it's priations Committee that oversees early. billions of dollars in federal spend- No serious opposition loomed at ing for labor, health and human the same stage of his 1992 campaign, services, and education. either, Then came the Supreme As chairman, Specter can call a. Court confirmation ligaring for hearing any time he Ants. Today, The Philadelphia Inquirer / MICHAEL MALLY U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter reviews material on gulf war syndrome submitted by Anthony Stevenson of Camp Hill (right). he has chosen to inject the Senate States eventually finds its way to into a hot education controversy. the United States Senate." This is the decision of the Oakland, Before the hearing, Specter had Calif., school district to have its made himself available to CNN for a teachers employ Ebonies — the ver- coffee-time interview, broadcast na- nacular of many African Americans tionally. The hearing itself has gone — in teaching black students to out nationally on C-Span. The press read and speak standard English. tables were crowded. For one day, Invited to testify for five minutes aside from the continuing furor each, five officials from the Oak- over Newt Gingrich's leadership in land schools have traveled 3,000 the House, Specter's hearing domi- miles at their district's expense. nated news attention on Capitol "It's one of those things you can't Hill. say no to," said Jean Quan, the In Washington, as in Pennsylva- school board president. nia — where he has been tearing It turns out, the hearing is basical- about of late, doing school appear- ly for Specter's benefit:For most of ances and meeting with editorial the two-hour session, he sits alone boards — Specter is trying to raise at the senators' podium, flanked by his profile as he heads into next 16 empty chairs. One other senator year's campaign. Last week, he appears at the outset and denounces again drew national attention by Ebonies as "political correctness calling — and chairing — a veter- gone out of control." Then he ans committee hearing at which leaves. A second arrives late, stays Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf denied 20 minutes or so, and leaves. ever having knowingly exposed But Specter is intently interested, American soldiers to poison gas dur- all the way. ing the gulf war. To his son Shanin, a medical-mal- Specter believes, he said, that af- practice lawyer in Philadelphia, it ter veering right in recent years, illustrated Specter's intellectual joy U.S. politics is moving back toward in trampling through a difficult is- the center — the position where he sue. One thing his father loves judges himself to be. That includes about being a senator, he said, is firm support for education and for that "every problem th the United some health-care reform al- though not the original plan of he feels, 'There's work to be done:" I President Clinton, which Specter at- • tacked as a bureaucratic nightmare. Arlen Specter's father, Harr a Specter's ill-starred presidential Jewish immigrant from Russia, was campaign, in which he was the GOP in the First World War. candidate identified as being most "He was inducted in Nebraska "pro-choice" in terms of abortion, April 1918," Specter said. "Twen failed to gain him much leverage. nine days later, they shipped biN In fact, he said, it may have made overseas. And he was cannon fed. as many enemies in his conserva- der. He didn't know how to shoot tive party as it did friends.-Ed How- his gun.... He was badly wound ard, his longtime friend, remem- Shrapnel in his legs." • bered "fearing for his safety" at Years later, during the Depres; political rallies in Iowa. sion, Harry Specter was among vet; "He never backed away from any erans who marched on Washington of those rallies. I admire his guts, demanding a bonus they believed his courage. He took the message had been promised to them. Federal into some places where he may troops dispersed them at gunpoint: have been the only one in the room The experience seared not Only ` who wanted to hear it.... I think it the old veteran, but also the s' was very wearing on him." who only heard about it. It provide In the Senate, too, Specter has one of the major motivations that sometimes been .a bit of a loner. drove him into 'politics. "They fixed on 'em," Arlen S Said Howard: "The Senate is 'a ter said in disbelief. "They shot 'erni, very clubby institution, and" don't And I say with real seriousness tliaT think he's part of the club. ... I I have been on my way td Washing. think people look on him with a ton ever since to get my father's. bo measure of awe and respect. I don't nus." think they look on him with admira- . Anyone who wishes to take away tion. .. , He doesn't win points be- his.
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