Oh my stars! :eek:
THAT’S what happened! 
How depressing, though. It’s so much better to have sane enemies. At least if you don’t always win it doesn’t mean there’s monkeys burning down the house.
jtgain
While the rural areas of PA are “mostly conservative”, no one really cares. Philly, Pittsburgh and “moving toward liberal” Harrisburg are the population centers where the Repubs need to get votes, and they are having a hard time doing so.
Santorum is a joke. He was the number 3 Republican and couldn’t count on that to keep him in office. He tried to promote Intelligent Design by adding it in to the “No Child Left Behind” Act. Not to mention the equating of homosexuality with bestiality.
I promise not to vote for Toomey.
We Pittsburghers lean Democratic, too.
I have heard Pennsylvania described as “Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Alabama in between”. I try hard to make sure to vote and cancel out at least one vote from the center of the state.
I always heard it as “Pennsyltucky.” From people who grew up there.
I’ve never lived there, but I’ve driven around the area a lot, and Appalachia from Tennessee through Kentucky, southeast Ohio and West Virginia, to central Pennsylvania does seem to be a distinct region.
I have to comment on this. I used to joking say the same thing, oh almost 20 years ago. Times change. Central PA is more liberal and progressive than it is given credit for. As noted above, Harrisburg is pretty blue and that has spread to the surrounding areas. The backwards folk stereotype has got to end. There are still pockets of places that may still fit that image, but “Pennsyltucky” we aren’t. Obama won by a decent margin here, and it wasn’t just Philly carrying him.
Well, in that case, you were the one with a delusional opinion about the public mood.
So Toomey has some interesting choices to make. If he moderates to improve his electoral chances, he’ll alienate his extremist conservative buds. (He used to be the chairman of the Club for Growth.) If he wants to be a mover and shaker in the cigar smoke filled back rooms of Pub conservatives, he’s probably going to lose the election.
I don’t think he understands this. I think he really believes that Pubs are losing because they are moving to the left, rather than – like Specter – they are moving to the left because they are losing.
That’s a good electoral strategy: We don’t care about you.
Republicans have never won urban areas and they will continue to not win them. Reagan didn’t win them. Bush I and Bush II in his two wins never won them.
All of these “Republicans need to do X to win” posts that have infiltrated this board come from posters who don’t want Republicans to win. These posts all show extreme overconfidence in the level of the victory last year. The GOP is not dead by any stretch and they don’t need any type of massive overhaul of their message. They simply need to rid themselves of the personalities who became drunk on their own power. Santorum was one of those…
Then why are they lining up to kiss Rush Limbaugh’s dimpled ass, pray tell?
Because what they NEED to do and what they ARE doing are two different things?
Yeah, you go ahead with the same message. We’ll enjoy watching you lose over and over again.
Santorum’s main problem, I think, was that he was a sex-crazed (in terms of ranting about it) conservative Christian, and Bob Casey was a lot more appealing.
Power-crazy incumbents do not alone make a party lose 50 House seats and 14 Senate seats in two cycles, not to mention the White House, several governors’ mansions, and not a few legislatures. You’ve got bigger problems than that.
Yes, the big picture is that the American electorate is slowly moving to the left (even if it’s nowhere near Canada or western Europe yet), while the GOP is rapidly moving to the right, and there doesn’t seem to be a realistic scenario where it would move back towards the centre.
What might happen is a new centre-right party, formed from moderate Republicans like Senators Snowe and Collins (R-ME), and moderate Democrat leaners or independents like Senators Lieberman and Specter. If I had a vote, I wouldn’t vote for a party like that (I’m too leftist), but it would fill what is now a gap in the political spectrum, and appeal to a large segment of the voting public. The big problem is that electoral laws in the US are hugely biassed against third parties.
Bob Casey appealing? Have you seen the man’s eyebrows? :dubious:
OK, Santorum was being pushed hard by the GOP because he was a Republican Senator from a large rust belt state. And he didn’t handle it well. His head swelled. The thing I remember the most about him was that his collars were always tight around his neck, and he looked like “Sam the Eagle” from the Muppet Show.
Pennslytucky it is not. That’s mostly spouted by (IME) from the snobby weenies from NJ, who elect their own set of “advanced” people. The Alabama in the middle always comes around at Presidential election time, but that’s the media. And anyone in NJ who couldn’t tell that McGreevy was gay was as delusional as any “Pennsyltuckian”
When it comes down to it, Philly IS the major problem for Republicans. Pittsburgh leans to the left, but they are a mostly fiscally conservative group and as a whole I’d guess they are pretty centrist, even if they tend to vote democratic. But they vote democratic in large part out of habit. The unions were very strong there, and families tend to vote the way their parents did. I had a conversation about this with my father, who’s father was a union man. A very social and fiscal conservative voted Democrat because they were for the working man. My father voted democrat for the same reason. But on most singular issues, they would be right of center.
If PA could give Philly to NJ, Republicans would have a chance.
And seeing Spector move to the Dems is both a great and pathetic thing. Great in that the Republican party will be rid of the man who came up with the “magic bullet” theory, but pathetic in that he just can’t give up the power. He’s in his 70’s. Go play with the grandchildren, already.
Toomey is an interesting choice. He scared Spector enough to dump the party that kept him in the Senate for twenty years, but how he plays in the state will be a good watch if he wins the primary. Ridge will go down against Spector, but Toomey is another animal. He is a true fiscal conservative, and I think most people on both sides of the spectrum are fed up with the spending in Washington. I don’t think Arlen is a shoe-in, and if he loses, I think it will send a strong message to the country that many of us are fed up with the bailouts, tarps, monopoly money and the “government will solve all your problems” mantra that has been mixed into everyone’s kool-aid.
A huge Congressional win in 94; held Congress in every year from 96 to 2006 with victories in the Presidential race in 2000 and 2004; all with the same “hard right” ideology regarding abortion, gay marriage, school prayer, whatever.
Sure, you can pick out some of the more extreme positions: no stem cell research, Terry Shaivo, etc. and accurately say that most people don’t agree with those positions. They also don’t turn most people away.
This country isn’t like this board. I think you see a strong majority of people who are very socially conservative that the GOP appeals to. Where the GOP lost was in its hypocrisy over spending: saying that it was the party of fiscal discipline when it simply continued big government.
What?
You know we’re currently fighting arguably the least popular war in American history, right?
That’s very true. Only 18-25% of Americans identify as Republicans. A lot fewer than on this board.
The ACTUAL center is relatively left-leaning. More than a few miles away from here… I make no promises.
And that message isn’t working anymore, you fucking moron. Or did you miss the parts where you lost significantly in 2006 and 2008? (and in the former you failed to knock off a single Democratic Congressional incumbent)
Actually, I think you’ll find only a minority of Americans are socially conservative. Check out the Pew Political Typology groups and stats.