PA Map (in my opinion)

[Keystone Phil]

Delco is dark red? No. Lehigh County is red? No.

[Keystone Phil]

Delco is dark red? No. Lehigh County is red? No.

Would you put them as white?

Delco - white. Lehigh - light blue maybe white. The Dems have had their day in Lehigh, Flyers. That day is long gone now.

[Keystone Phil]

Why the hell is Lehigh county trending right? Is this true?

More and more young professionals are moving into the area. Economic and social conservative families in the area. The days were unions used to be pretty powerful in the area are over.

[Keystone Phil]

Why the hell is Lehigh county trending right? Is this true?

More and more young professionals are moving into the area. Economic and social conservative families in the area. The days were unions used to be pretty powerful in the area are over.

Yes, but the same can be said about Montgomery and Bucks counties.  Theya re flying left as a result.  danwxman has a point here.

dan didn't post a point, Flyers. He asked if it was true and it is. Montco GOP still has atleast some presence. Lehigh Dems are pretty much gone. (By the way, your fantasy about Bucks has to end. The GOP still dominates on the local level there.)

[Keystone Phil]

Lehigh Dems aren't "gone" just yet, but they have slipped.  They are holding on to dear life with Jennifer Mann though.  From what I heard she is quite popular in her district.  Should have won the Senate seat though.

They have Mann and Rooney. That's pretty much all thats left of them. And every year it keeps moving to the right...

[Keystone Phil]

Lehigh Dems aren't "gone" just yet, but they have slipped.  They are holding on to dear life with Jennifer Mann though.  From what I heard she is quite popular in her district.  Should have won the Senate seat though.

They have Mann and Rooney. That's pretty much all thats left of them. And every year it keeps moving to the right...

Rooney should have ran for Congress.  He would have proabably won easily instead of carpetbagging that fool Driscoll.

He wouldn't win against Dent. Closer, of course, but no win. I'm guess about 52% Dent and 48% Rooney

[Keystone Phil]

now if flyers could do a SEPA map...

...please restore some sanity and do your own. 

[Keystone Phil]

That CD has also been competitive.

2000 - 53% Toomey
2002 - 57% Toomey
2004 - 59% Dent

It's moving into the safe Republican territory.

[Keystone Phil]

We have to see if that increase in GOP vote share is due to party or candidate.

Dent is WAAAAY more moderate than Toomey.

But does that make the district moderate? No. Look at the 2004 and 2002 numbers. If Dent being more moderate means that the district is much more moderate, why did it only go for Dent by two points more than it did for Toomey?

That area is growing rapidly. I spend a good amount of time there (I have family who reside in the area). Economic conservatives (young professionals) who stay pretty close to the area's social conservative roots.

[Keystone Phil]

We have to see if that increase in GOP vote share is due to party or candidate.

Dent is WAAAAY more moderate than Toomey.

But does that make the district moderate? No. Look at the 2004 and 2002 numbers. If Dent being more moderate means that the district is much more moderate, why did it only go for Dent by two points more than it did for Toomey?

That area is growing rapidly. I spend a good amount of time there (I have family who reside in the area). Economic conservatives (young professionals) who stay pretty close to the area's social conservative roots.

Ahem...the fact that Dent didn't run against Ed O'Brien (gah...a corpse could beat him)...might explain why the democrats were able to dampen the moderate advantage

Ahem...bringing a Main Line liberal up was worse than running O'Brien.

[Keystone Phil]

Why the hell is Lehigh county trending right? Is this true?

More and more young professionals are moving into the area. Economic and social conservative families in the area. The days were unions used to be pretty powerful in the area are over.

Until the New York exurbanites come in, like in Monroe and Pike counties. 

I think Phil is forgetting that factor.  Lehigh stayed for the Dems, in fact, it went more for Kerry than Gore.  Dent is also WAAY more moderate than Toomey and beat a carpetbagger.  I don't know what the Democrats were thinking with Joe Driscoll.

The New York exurbanites are already coming in. Kerry barely won. Dent is more moderate yet only did two points better than Toomey did in 2002. The Lehigh Valley, as much as you'd love to see it be moderate-lean left, keeps moving to the right. You might be winning in our area, Flyers but you're losing in Lehigh.

[Keystone Phil]

Toomey beat a total boob named Ed O'Brien twice.  Toomey came off more prim and proper and O'Brien came off as a flaky union guy.  I will say this- The Democratic party in PA outside of the Philadelphia area had best better get its act together.  There are a couple of "accidents" the Dems had that could have easily been avoided such as Santorum, Hart, Toomey, and now Fitzpatrick had they put up the right candidate.  All of the above people won races they should have never won, but surely they took advantage of Democratic incompetence.  Now we only have Toomey gone and still have 3 young, ultra-conservative nut job Catholics to eliminate.  For some reason, the Dems get scared off by these people and dont' want to do anything to stop them until now.  Hopefully, Chris Heinz decides to take on Melissa Hart and Patrick Murphy can make a run for MIke Fitzpatrick in PA 8.   

Heinz can't beat Hart especially since she has a spot on Ways and Means now.

[Keystone Phil]

Toomey beat a total boob named Ed O'Brien twice.  Toomey came off more prim and proper and O'Brien came off as a flaky union guy.  I will say this- The Democratic party in PA outside of the Philadelphia area had best better get its act together.  There are a couple of "accidents" the Dems had that could have easily been avoided such as Santorum, Hart, Toomey, and now Fitzpatrick had they put up the right candidate.  All of the above people won races they should have never won, but surely they took advantage of Democratic incompetence.  Now we only have Toomey gone and still have 3 young, ultra-conservative nut job Catholics to eliminate.  For some reason, the Dems get scared off by these people and dont' want to do anything to stop them until now.  Hopefully, Chris Heinz decides to take on Melissa Hart and Patrick Murphy can make a run for MIke Fitzpatrick in PA 8.   

Heinz can't beat Hart especially since she has a spot on Ways and Means now.

Heinz beating Hart? That's near impossible.

Thank you. That name can only get you so far. He'd do better than Hart's past challengers, that's for sure, but he still wouldn't win it.

[Keystone Phil]

Two points isn't that much considering how much more moderate Dent is and they carpetbagged someone for crying out loud. 

That's all I hear from you. "He's more moderate." Yes, I understand that. However, that only proves my point that the area is not moderate. If it was, Dent would have broke 60%.

[Keystone Phil]

Patrick Murphy...more democratic cannonfodder in PA 8...

The Bucks County Democratic Party (indeed all PA 8 democrats) need to take a break from inserting their heads up their collective posteriors and run a candidate who can win...not some candidate they'd like to win. At least Fawkes and the county GOP have realized this notion.

The last democrat in this seat was Peter Kostemeyer...a fiscally moderate, socially liberal (well moderately liberal...remember it was the 80s)

A moderate conservative will beat a populist in PA 8 any day of the week. Unless Fitzpatrick has been secretely found to be eating small children and animals.

Let them think they have a winner, throw tons of money in the race and end up losing elsewhere.    Murphy will be better than Schrader though (not like that's hard to do...)

[Keystone Phil]

Well Schrader was supposed to be a sacrificial offering to Greenwood...She would have been fortunate to get anything higher than the high 30% range against Jim.

Yet people, including yourself, thought she had the ability to win the seat once Greenwood announced he was leaving.

[Keystone Phil]

Well Schrader was supposed to be a sacrificial offering to Greenwood...She would have been fortunate to get anything higher than the high 30% range against Jim.

Yet people, including yourself, thought she had the ability to win the seat once Greenwood announced he was leaving.

An opportunity...certainly better than what she had against Jim...depending on who fawkes ran...rumor was for years that he wanted an arch conservative to run...(Greenwood in the seat wasn't what he wanted in the first place)...

Well, you didn't just see an opporunity. I should have put that you seemed convinced that PA 8 would be a Dem pickup.

[Keystone Phil]

Would you mind finding some quotes from me...I need some egg on my face every once in a while...

Well, I don't want to see egg on your face since you're my PA 8 pal on this forum but in this case, you don't know how happy I am that you were wrong.


You say that it is likely a Dem pickup. I couldn't believe how many agreed with you.

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=5866.msg156129#msg156129

[Keystone Phil]

Ah well...I voted for Mike...and will so again, unless things change drastically.

And that's all that matters! 

Now we just need you to support Santorum and everything will be fine. 

[Keystone Phil]

Ah well...I voted for Mike...and will so again, unless things change drastically.

And that's all that matters! 

Now we just need you to support Santorum and everything will be fine. 

I'm still totally undecided on the senate race.

Two social conservatives. One is economically conservative, the other is not. Sounds like Santorum is right for you. 

[Keystone Phil]

Then again, I hold the Caseys in high esteem, am not crazy about Santorum...and theres always the LP option or write in.

I like Casey, too. I'm always looking for people to vote for Santorum but I must admit that a Libertarian or other third party candidate will probably be closer to you. That actually helps Santorum in the SE so I don't mind all that much.