Talk Elections

Here's my list of Senators who vote more with the opposite party than with their own party (D->R):

Susan Collins (R-ME)
Olympia Snowe (R-ME)
Ben Nelson (D-NE)

Please say whether you agree or disagree with my picks and/or add members to it.

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What source do you have for that?  On partisan procedural votes, I bet they aren't all that strongly against their own party.

I didn't say strongly against their own party. I said sides against their party more often than not.

OK, but what source do you have for this?

Ben Nelson is a DINO, yes. The ME Senators are not RINOs, and neither is the more liberal Specter.

Was John Breaux a DINO?

Just for reference, here's the voting records of the senators mentioned on key Senate votes:

Olympia Snowe (http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/s000663/key-votes/): 54% GOP position, 46% Dem position
Susan Collins (http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/c001035/key-votes/): 64% GOP position, 36% Dem position
Ben Nelson (http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/n000180/key-votes/): 93% GOP position, 7% Dem position
Arlen Specter (http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress/members/s000709/key-votes/): 69% GOP position, 31% Dem position

(Note: Votes on bills are not counted if the senator did not vote or if both parties' positions on the bill were the same)

So... Olympia Snowe is borderline but still a Republican, Susan Collins and Arlen Specter are definitely moderate Republicans, and Ben Nelson is... surprising, to say the least.

What makes one a RINO or a DINO????

Some say that someone is a _INO if that person votes against his or her own party's position a majority of the time.  Some say that someone is a _INO if that person supports candidates of the other party a majority of the time.  Some say that someone is a _INO if that person simply is out of the mainstream of his or her party.  There's no objective definition of the term, which is a problem, because it means that people can use it essentially to attack anyone they want without fearing that they might be proven wrong.

May I rephrase this: Can you make a list of all the senators between the most liberal Republican (Olympia Snowe) and the most conservative Democrat (Ben Nelson)? Here is mine:
Ben Nelson (D-NE)
Gordon Harold Smith (R-OR)
Arlen Specter (R-PA)
Susan Collins (R-ME)
Mary Landrieu (D-LA)
Olympia Snowe  (R-ME)

I'm surprised at Snowe's percentage there... I did some research into stuff like that early in the millennium and she wasn't much different from Specter or McCain or Gordon Smith or even Thad Cochran. She was certainly voting to the right of Collins around then. In fact, when you remember that Senators do not purely vote their positions but also have their electorates in mind... you'd be tempted to put her to the right of all of them.
Mind you, all were definitely voting with the Republicans more than half the time.
Nelson was pretty close to 50/50 back then from what I remember... Zell Miller was definitely a hardcore Republican in all but name, Chafee was closer to Dem than Rep.

It will be interesting to see who will be the biggest RINO's in the House next session. According to National Journal, the 10 most liberal returning House Republicans are (excluding Ron Paul and Jeff Flake since they are libertarian):

Shays, CT
Castle, DE
Kirk, IL
Ehlers, MI
Johnson, IL
Wilson, NM
Gilchrest, MD
Jones, NC
Ramstad, MN
Biggert, IL

Miller, frankly, ought to be in the Constitution Party with his views in the last several years.

By no means throughout the 90s, throughout his service as Governor was he a "DINO."  He did a lot of good progressive things, and was simply an old-style democrat; perhaps a bit socially conservative, but firmly on the side of the democrats on bread-and-butter issues.

That all has changed.  He's now a wacko who wants to take away the income tax and the people's right to elect Senators.  He says the party left him, but you'd have to go back to Grover Cleaveland to find a Democrat that represents him.

Lincoln Davis, TN

There are more DINOs than RINOs now - a lot of moderate Republicans lost in 2006 and battle-hardened incumbents like Chris Shays are not going to switch now.  I always thought Specter was likely to switch, but apparently not. 

Flake's a libertarian as well.

Flake is a libertarian, and everyone on that list except for Jones (R-NC) is right of center, according to republicanliberty.org

In that case, the next person on the list is Judy Biggert (IL).

Was surprised to see Jones on this list...he is extremely socially conservative...perhaps he voted to the right of the Republicans on some issues.