Olympia Snowe Is Not Switching Parties

There's been a good deal of speculation lately that Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe, who's up for re-election in 2012, might switch parties, since she's a moderate Republican likely to face a conservative primary challenger in a state that just handed Republicans control of the House, Senate and governor's mansion for the first time since the 1960s. And they didn't hand it to moderate Republicans like Snowe: new governor Paul LePage is a Tea Party stalwart who, as the Boston Globe notes, "has cursed at reporters and threatened to punch one" and "once promised to tell the president of the United States to 'go to hell.'"

If I were Snowe, I'd sure be thinking about a Democratic bid, or, even better, an independent bid for reelection. (Independent gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler finished a point behind LePage.) Doesn't sound like Snowe has any intention of doing either, though. She's just signed on to an amicus brief challenging the constitutionality of the health care law. And her fellow-moderate from Maine, Susan Collins, has, too.