Note: The following was written by Travis Johnson, the head of Progressive Republicans.

President Obama was inaugurated in January, but the Obama Era officially began today. Don’t believe me? wait til you see what he does with the filibuster-proof majority we gave him by driving Senator Specter from the Party.

I’m appalled. Not at Senator Specter. At the Republican Party. You, me, all of us. Everyone one of us with an (R) behind his name on his voter registration card is responsible for losing Senator Specter and any chance of controlling the Senate again for a very long time.

Everyone who thought, because the Senator occasionally used his own judgment and chose not to vote in lock-step with the Party, that he needed to be driven out is responsible.

I’m looking at you, Pat Toomey, the chair of the Club for Growth, who saw ever-shrinking, but more vocally conservative Pennsylvania Republican Party as an ideal vehicle to launch his career in elected office. I’m looking at you RNC Chairman Michael Steele who thoughtit would be a god idea to threaten to endorse Toomey in the primary, an unprecedented move for a national party chair. I’m looking at you, Rush Limbaugh and the rest of the “conservative” media who think the ratings they build up by inciting their followers into a populist frenzy is more important than the advice of most major economists, even their fellow conservatives.

Never mind that Specter had given 43 years to the Republican Party, with 29 of those in the US Senate. Never mind the fact that Toomey has even less a chance of winning the General Election than he did when he challenged Specter in 2003. Never mind the fact that removing Specter from office would take away Pennsylvania’s seniority within the Senate. History and reality didn’t matter. Specter was an apostate who had to be driven out of the congregation!

Every Republican who supported Senator Specter and his beliefs but didn’t speak up should is responsble for this. We should have cried out with a stronger, more unified voice when Specter was attacked over his pro-choice positions (even thought NARAL considered him pro-life). We should have risen to his defense when he voted against a constitutional ban on gay marriage. Many of us even defended his right to vote with President Obama on the stimulus package (even though we disagreed), because he had a right as an INDIVIDUAL, not just as a member of his party to vote his conscience. But, still, that wasn’t enough.

Senator Specter has voted YES on a Balanced Budget Amendment. He voted YES on reducing Federal Spending by 40 Billion dollars. He voted YES on tax cuts. he voted YES on Federal spending caps. He received an 81% voting record from the Christian Coalition, marking him as “pro-family.” He fought for free trade. He fought to seat Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas in the face of overwhelming liberal bias against him. This is the kind of man who doesn’t fit the mold of a Republican? This is the kind of Senator who must be driven from the Party?

No. The terrible treatment of progressive/moderate Republicans has gone on long enough. If this party is ever to regain power again, it must either do some serious soul-searching and do it quickly or the exodus of independent-thinking Republicans (many of whom, in Pennsylvania at least, have already left the party) won’t stop until the Party of Lincoln is no more.

Now is the time for progressive/moderate Republicans to speak out strongly and demand a seat at the table. Tell the conservatives who run the Party in your community that you want to be involved, but you are not going to compromise your beliefs in order to get along. The days of “go along to get along” as one of my guest bloggers said last week, are done. Senator Specter has shown that we can’t be expected to be taken for granted anymore.