In this year's U.S. Senate race, Constitution Party candidate Jim Clymer has been insisting that Republican incumbent Arlen Specter and Democratic challenger Joe Hoeffel are both liberals.

"There really is no significant difference between them on the major issues," Clymer said.

But he is wrong.

A thorough review of Specter's and Hoeffel's voting records and campaign rhetoric shows significant differences in the positions of the two major candidates.

Pennsylvania voters will have a choice when they select a senator on Nov. 2, whether or not they consider a third-party candidate.

To be sure, Specter and Hoeffel both lie to the left of the arch-conservative Clymer on the political spectrum.

Specter and Hoeffel describe themselves as pro-choice, oppose privatization of Social Security, and oppose a proposed constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

But even on those issues, there are nuances separating Specter, a four-term senator, and Hoeffel, a three-term U.S. representative from Montgomery County.

Abortion, Social Security, gay marriage

On abortion, pro-choice groups have given Hoeffel perfect scores. But Specter has spurned those organizations over the last two years in voting for the partial-birth abortion ban and for the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which classifies an attack on a pregnant woman as separate crimes against her and her fetus.

On Social Security, Hoeffel has consistently opposed privatization, while Specter has reversed his position after stating during this spring's Republican primary that he supports allowing workers to divert a limited amount of funds into private investment accounts.

And on gay marriage, Hoeffel has said, "It is important that same-sex couples have equal protections under the law," while Specter has made a point of stating that he favors allowing states to put gay-marriage bans in their own constitutions, if they so wish.

Much larger gaps separate Specter and Hoeffel on some issues, though.

Especially on guns and taxes.

Gun control

Consistently, organizations advocating stricter gun-control laws have given Hoeffel perfect scores, while anti-gun-control groups, such as the National Rifle Association, have given the Democrat "Fs" or zeros.

The NRA has endorsed Specter.

In September, the gulf between the two candidates on gun control came into bold relief, when the Republican-controlled Congress allowed the assault-weapons ban to expire.

Specter voted against extending the ban, calling it ineffective. Hoeffel, in contrast, has introduced a bill to reinstate the ban.

Taxes

The two candidates have contrasted just as sharply on tax and budgetary issues.

Specter has boasted of voting for the entire package of President Bush's tax cuts. Hoeffel has voted against those tax cuts almost every time, arguing that they disproportionately benefit millionaires and bloat the deficit.

The tax breaks have coincided with the addition of the more than 1.5 million jobs to the nation's economy over the past year, Specter has said.

"We know there has been [an economic] rebound," he said. "I'm not attributing it to tax cuts, because I don't think you can prove it. But we have had the tax cuts and there has been a resurgence."

Hoeffel, a self-described "deficit hawk," favors repealing tax cuts for those making more than $200,000 a year and leaving the cuts in place for everyone else.

"Rather than reckless tax cuts for millionaires, we need to balance the budget, pay down the national debt and strengthen the Social Security and Medicare trust funds," Hoeffel has stated.

Hoeffel favors gradually raising the cap on Social Security payroll taxes to strengthen that trust fund. As it stands now, just the first $89,000 of an employee's salary is taxed, which the Democrat considers regressive.

He also wants to see a 5-cent increase in the gas tax to better fund highway maintenance and mass transit.

Specter opposes any increase in either the Social Security cap or the gas tax.

The senator, responding to a Project Vote Smart questionnaire, did not include the economy or tax reform in a list of his top three legislative priorities, mentioning instead the war on terrorism, education and health care.

Hoeffel, in comparison, put job growth first on his list and has put forward a 29-page economic plan, which is posted on his campaign Web site.

Health care and education round out his list of legislative priorities, as they do Specter's.

Health care

The incumbent touts his role in exponentially increasing research funding for the National Institutes of Health. In one of his latest campaign commercials, actor Michael J. Fox praises the senator for championing medical research.

In the commercial, Fox doesn't specifically mention stem-cell research, but as a Parkinson's Disease sufferer, he most likely approves of the senator's position on that issue.

Parting company with pro-life activists, Specter last year publicly urged President Bush to increase the number of stem cell lines available to medical researchers.

Hoeffel also favors expanding stem cell research.

The two candidates have sparred, though, over other health-care issues.

Hoeffel has accused Specter of doing nothing to expand access to medical care in a nation where more than 45 million people lack health insurance.

Specter, in response, points out that he has introduced legislation to provide universal coverage. The centerpiece of his bill, which has never advanced in the Senate, is a provision allowing small businesses and individuals to purchase health insurance at group rates.

Hoeffel supports Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kerry's health care plan, which entails allowing citizens to join the health insurance system for federal employees at a cost of hundreds of billions of dollars to the government.

The two candidates no longer differ over the Medicare prescription drug bill, which passed last year with Specter voting for it and Hoeffel against it.

Now, they agree on the changes that should be made to the much-maligned Medicare plan. They support reimportation of drugs, with caveats, and they support using the federal government's buying power to negotiate drug discounts with pharmaceutical companies.

Education

Specter and Hoeffel both voted for Bush's No Child Left Behind Act and both have supported increasing the size of Pell Grants to help students pay for college.

They both oppose private-school vouchers and they both favor affirmative action in college admissions.

They disagree on at least one education matter, though. Hoeffel favors giving states additional federal money to increase the number of teachers, while Specter does not.

Iraq

Specter, who has met personally over the years with Saddam Hussein and numerous other world leaders, and Hoeffel, the only Pennsylvania Democrat on the House International Relations Committee, share an intense interest in foreign policy matters.

Both candidates voted for the resolution that authorized President Bush to invade Iraq.

And now that the U.S.-led coalition is struggling to maintain security there, both congressmen want more help from America's allies.

But despite these areas of agreement, Hoeffel has made Iraq an issue in the campaign.

The Democrat has voiced regret over voting for the invasion resolution, accusing the president's national security adviser and Central Intelligence Agency director of lying to Congress about the presence of weapons of mass destruction.

Specter has stated that the vote on the Iraq resolution "cannot appropriately be judged by 20/20 hindsight." But he also has stated that the invasion might never have been justified had the intelligence been better.

Judicial confirmations

Specter has taken heat from Clymer on the right and Hoeffel on the left over his posture toward judicial nominees.

The issue has assumed importance in this race, because Specter would become chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee next year if he wins re-election next month.

Curiously, Clymer has accused Specter of fighting against the confirmation of Bush's judicial nominees "every step of the way," even though the senator has voted for the confirmation of every one of them.

Hoeffel, on the other hand, has blasted Specter for supporting every nominee.

Specter has maintained that "the forces of moderation really need me in the Judiciary Committee in the chairman's position."

Should Specter lose to Hoeffel, the Judiciary Committee chairmanship would fall to Arizona's Jon Kyl, whom the National Journal rated as the most conservative member of the Senate two years ago.

With turnover imminent on the Supreme Court, Specter has said he wants to see the president nominate a brilliant legal mind, someone of the caliber of Louis Brandeis or Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., esteemed justices from the first half of the 20th century.

Environment

With Iraq and the economy dominating the political debate this year, the Senate candidates have been saying little about the environment.

But that doesn't mean their positions are alike.

Hoeffel has consistently received high ratings from the Sierra Club and League of Conservation Voters.

In June, he voted against the omnibus energy bill, legislation that would have done too little to encourage conservation or promote alternatives to fossil fuels, in the view of environmentalists.

While the energy bill passed in the House, the Senate has not acted on it.

Last year, Hoeffel voted against and Specter voted for Bush's forests initiative, a bill that some environmental groups have warned would lead to increased commercial logging in national forests.

Specter in recent years has received low ratings from environmental groups.

Last year, the senator voted against legislation that would have delayed the implementation of the Bush administration's new, controversial air-quality regulations for six months.

The delay would have given the National Academy of Sciences time to study the public-health effects of the new regulations. Although six Republican senators voted for the delay, the legislation was narrowly defeated.

Clymer

As the Constitution Party's candidate, Clymer has presented himself as the only conservative in the race, emphasizing his staunch opposition to abortion.

He favors a narrowing in the separation of church and state.

"Every law that is enacted has to have some religious underpinning to it," he said. "Ours happens to be the Judeo-Christian religion."

Clymer has stated that he wants to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education. And his party's platform calls for the elimination of the Internal Revenue Service and Food and Drug Administration, as well.

At a speech in State College last week, Clymer advocated tort reform, saying "reasonable caps" are needed in medical malpractice and product liability awards.

Summers

Libertarian candidate Betsy Summers participated in both of the Senate candidate debates but has otherwise run a virtually invisible campaign.

She pledges to never vote for a tax increase and opposes the proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage, saying, "Nobody should be treated as a second-class citizen."