The defection of Arlen Specter from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party has stirred up a lot of political debate over what his change of party affiliation truly means. The Democrats, or at least a large portion of them, speculate that Specter walking the plank, jumping up and down a few times, and then taking a swan dive onto the quarterdeck of the party of Leftward ideologies, is evidence that the Republican Party’s ship is sinking, and that Arlen was smart to abandon the party before the entire vessel winds up lying on the bottom of the ocean of political history as yet another failed party that was unable to change with the times.