Harry Reid, Joe Biden, and Ed Rendell get together in a room and the next thing you know Pennsylvania voters have their choices restricted and their futures set for them. No. thanks.

Pennsylvania before this switch was an excellent prospect for a Better Democrat, and it still can be. If Arlen Specter does enough good for the party between now and next year to win a Democratic primary, good on him. But the only way he’ll even consider doing those good things is if there’s a chance he’ll face a real Democrat in the primary.

I think Specter’s switch is a strategic negative for the Democrats:

1. I predict he will vote with the R’s just as much as he did when he was an R.

2. I don’t think he’ll vote with the D’s even on “cloture” motions.

3. I think he is a Lieberman clone inasmuch as he will always try to position himself as the fulcrum vote on key issues (just like he did on the stimulus package). This will invariably hurt the content of those bills, just as it did on the “stimulus” package.

4. The D’s are going to take Pennsylvania in 2010 anyway, and could have had a much better candidate. I hope Sestak will decide to run, so that D primary voters at least have a choice.

5. I think Reid, Rendell, and Biden have really goofed up strategically — Specter is going to be a phantom 60th vote.

6. Just having the 60th vote on paper will give the R’s a major new argument for 2010 midterms (vote for R’s to “restore checks and balances”).