Olympia Snowe chides GOP for abandoning Reagan's "big tent" principle

Updated at 6:20 p.m. ET

Following the announcement she will not seek a fourth term in the Senate, moderate Republican Olympia Snowe on Wednesday chided her party for failing to reach out to moderates and independents.

Politicians have to "understand that you have to have tolerance for all philosophical views. It's a big tent," Snowe said on MSNBC, pointing out that even President Ronald Reagan prescribed to that philosophy. "That's going to be important for us in supporting a presidential candidate if we want to win."

In an interview with CBS News, Snowe added that there are "fewer and fewer within our ranks" of what she described as "a sensible center."

"You do have a shrinking center, without question. It's unfortunate," Snowe told CBS News correspondent Nancy Cordes.

Snowe said on MSNBC that she's talked to people all over the country, and they're fed up with partisan gridlock in Washington even more so than they are with the economy.

"I have to tell you, including my state of Maine, people are deeply frustrated," she said. "More about the fact that we are not getting things done in Congress... at this unprecedented moment in American history."

"If your motivation's to solve the problem, then you figure out how to do it and what you can agree on, and that's not what's happening in the Senate," Snowe told CBS News. "That doesn't mean you have to have people in the middle to get it done, you have to have people who are open-minded, who are reasonable, who are practical."

After Snowe announced her retirement on Tuesday, President Obama released a statement praising Snowe for her willingness to compromise.

"Senator Snowe's career demonstrates how much can be accomplished when leaders from both parties come together to do the right thing for the American people," he said.

Olympia Snowe will not seek re-election

While Mr. Obama may capitalize on Snowe's remarks to castigate the Republican Party for its opposition to his agenda, there's some speculation the senator could get behind a third party movement called Americans Elect that plans to run against Mr. Obama this year.

Americans Elect aims to let Americans pick a presidential ticket directly via the Internet. It plans on nominating a presidential candidate and vice-presidential candidate from opposing parties. Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine speculates that Snowe could serve on the ticket with David Boren, the former Democratic senator from Oklahoma who announced his backing of Americans Elect earlier this week.

Snowe's office had no comment on the speculation regarding Americans Elect, telling Hotsheet the senator plans to serve out the rest of her term in the Senate and is weighing her options for the future.

In her official announcement Tuesday, Snowe said, "It is time for change in the way we govern, and I believe there are unique opportunities to build support for that change from outside the United States Senate."

She reiterated that point again on MSNBC.

"I hope I can give voice to that in a different way outside of the Senate chamber," she said.

Watch an extended version of Nancy Cordes' interview with Sen. Snowe below:

[brwing]

Really? The problem is people are there too long, become invested in being there and the buying of votes through legislation. Instead of doing what is necessary fiscally they endlessly compromise everything until it is a watered down mess that delays the decisions necessary.
We have seen where all this big tent compromise got us. Indebted and darn near broke. No accountability. No oversight. No solutions that will not break us. Pandering to this group or that instead of doing what is best for all at a standard worth achieving.
It should be possible to find at least a billion dollars before breakfast on programs that are inappropriate, faded, ineffective, abused, and so on. Start with foreign policy and wasted money on aid and AIDS.
Then there is healthcare - gee Olympia, that one was forced down the throats of all of us with no debate on its contents. That was an autocratic process with no cooperation. I don't want a big tent - I want positions that make sense for America without the pandering to this Mob or that to include corporate America.
Let's run this like a business and let business run.
You can't look the other way when pension funds are not being funded and then pass a tax break for same corporation while assuming their debt.
Things are really upside down with this current crop. 33 years is too long - it was time she retired anyway. Stop griping about it Olympia.

[sirmarion-2009]

Snowe just wanted the White House invite so she could sit with the first lady. Snowe was as much the cause of gridlock as anyone,then asking for an exemption to Obamacare for the state of Maine after voting for it. Hypocrite from Maine.

[occupy_cbs]

tmittelstaed: "The financial situation under Kennedy was completely the opposite of today."



Yes, with much higher tax rates in 1963 to pay down the WWII debt, our national debt was $300 billion, or roughly half of our $600 billion GDP, and JFK was merely proposing to lower the top marginal rate from 91% down to 76%.

Ironically, it was the republicans in Congress that stopped this lowering of taxes in 1963, and quite a few of them voted against the 1964 legislation as well which cut individual tax rates across the board by approximately 20% -- the same ridiculous proposal by willard romney in 2012 when tax rates are already historically-LOW!

The Revenue Act of 1964 was aimed at the demand, rather than the supply, side of the economy, and this distinction, taught in Economics 101, seldom makes it into the Washington sound-bite wars.

[occupy_cbs]

RobAla: "..radical extremist socialist....Republicans have moved even farther to the right. President John Kennedy was for tax cuts and strong military."



Hey robbie -- you and your ilk show exactly how extreme the republican party has become, parroting the same frank luntz "buzz" words like "socialism" on a daily basis, without realizing how absurd you sound.

Yes, JFK proposed tax cuts in 1963 -- a huge republican talking point today with no bearing on fiscal responsibility -- but the top marginal rate was 91% at the time in order to payoff the WWII debt. Too bad the extremist republicans didn't get the memo that cutting taxes while waging TWO bush WARS was completely fiscally irresponsible, and the main reason we tripled our national debt since 2000 -- exactly what saint ronnie did between 1981-1989 by growing the military-industrial complex!

[occupy_cbs]

Snowe added that there are "fewer and fewer within our ranks" of what she described as "a sensible center."



Sen. Snowe is exactly correct, that moderates from both parties -- "the sensible center" -- have been driven out of Washington over the past few decades, and extremism is running rampant in our dysfunctional Congress.

This is not how we will ever solve our many problems in the 21st century!

[sirmarion-2009]

Snowe is a Hypocrite,she voted for Obamacare then ask for an exemption for the state of Maine.

[gep1955]

The deomcrats had complete control of the taxpayer purse strings for two years. They had the choice to rebuild a balance sheet flooded with red ink or spend like drunken sailors using a stolen credit card to sink each American taxpayer further into debt from $30k each to at the end of 2012 a projected $50k each. They chose the latter. Why would any clear thinkng American cast a vote for what are obviously socialist politicians bent on bringing America to its financial knees? We can no long use patriot and democrats in the same sentence.

[occupy_cbs]

Comparing the Kennedy, Reagan and Bush Tax Cuts

http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/323.html

[gep1955]

Good ridence. A moderate republican is a democrat lite. All reaching across the aile to deomcrats has done is create a corrupt political elite watching out for their own interests and those of their donors and have completly forgotten about taxpayers. Replace her with a hardcore right TEA Party candidate to help destroy and dismantle the corrupt Marxist/socialist liberal machine that pollutes Washington.

[RobAla]

Physics has a law that states "for every action, there is an equal opposite reaction".

What Snowe seems to ignore is what the Democrats have done. Democrats have given their leadership to extremist radical socialists, and as a reaction Republicans have moved farther the right in an attempt to stop the nonsense coming out of the Democrat party. Democrat President John Kennedy was for tax cuts and a strong defense. He would not even recognize today's Democrat party. Ex-Democrat Governor Zell Miller of Georgia said "I didn't leave the Democrat party, the Democrat party left me."

When a Democrat party forces the horrible health care law on a majority of Americans who don't want it, they should understand that there will be a strong reaction to it. When President Obama promised to be bipartisan, and then proves to be extremely partisan - there will be a reaction to it. When McCain tried to work with President Obama on health care, President Obama basically told him "I won, and you lost". When Republican members of Congress (who were also medical doctors) attempted to met with President Obama on health care, he didn't have time for them. However, President Obama did have the time to meet behind closed doors (so much for that transparency promise, as well) with union bosses to form one health care package for unions and a different one for the rest of us.

The radical actions of Democrats have caused a equal opposite reaction by Republicans. Snowe morns the "good ol' days" (in her mind) of little differences between the parties. Snowe is an extremely liberal Republican, and votes many times with Democrats. I doubt Snowe agreed with a lot of what President Reagan did, and she quotes President Reagan when it suits her. I am sure she has caught flack from members of her own party, but she is wrong to blame only the membership of her own party.

[occupy_cbs]

As usual, robbie give us his selective memory account of the past decade, railing against those darn Democrats that passed health care reform that Obama ran on in 2008, while completely leaving out the 'my way or the highway' GOP actions between 2000-2007, giving us severe revenue problems on top of a quadrupling of our national security/defense spending!

Way to go robbie -- you never miss a chance to spew partisan B.S.

[DCCorruption]

Of all of the GOP members, she's about the only one of a handful I have any respect for. The rest of them are a bunch of closed minded phony bible thumpers.

[democracy8]

My sentiments exactly.

[sirmarion-2009]

Another RINO bites the dust.

[varigdc10]

The one and only goal of the GOP is to oust Obama and Democrats, nothing else, even at the expense of the nation. Their leader and extremist is Boehner, who spends time in his tanning booth every day just coming up with ideas on how to make everything the Dems do to be bad at any cost !