[...] Hoeffel says he raised $400K… [...]

When did Hoeffel officially enter the race and begin fundraising?

Was it even a full quarter? The last quarter is one of the toughest because you are competing with the ongoing 2009 election and the holidays, before people are focused on 2010 races.

That said, Hoeffel needs to kick some serious @ss this quarter and win all the county endorsements in the South East. Montgomery county is a gimme. Hoeffel should do well in Delco as well, though he’ll face some competition from Knox. The progressive wards in Philly are thirsty for a true progressive candidate, so Hoeffel should win some key wards.
Chester and Bucks are a bit more conservative, so Onorato could find some support there, but Hoeffel should have enough regional contacts to pull a win, if he plays it smart.

Lehigh county is willing to swallow Sestak as a progressive, so a real progressive like Hoeffel should do well there.

David, it doesn’t matter when he entered — he set a fundraising goal for himself by the end of the year and barely reached 40 percent of his own target number. Huge disappointment.

Stosh-
It wasn’t a realistic number in the first place. A candidate sets that kind of goal to encourage donors to reach it. If he set the bar at $400,000 then he wouldn’t have raised even $300,000 since there would have been less push.

I was talking with one of my liberal/progressive friends on New Year’s. He’s political but didn’t realize that Hoeffel was running. When I mentioned Hoeffel, he was excited to know Joe was in the race, and was able to rattle off Joe’s resume as Congressman and County commissioner.

Once people in the SE realize Hoeffel is in the race and committed, his numbers should improve quickly. He’ll be in front of large crowds of committee people for the various endorsement and petition kick-off gatherings.

It’s not even a measure of hitting or not hitting a fundraising goal.

Based on this $400K reporting number, Hoeffel unfortunately has again proven his inability to raise any money (see his Senate race in 2004).

I line up with Hoeffel on the issues more than I do with Onorato, but I can’t support a primary candidate that would get slaughtered in the general based largely on his ineptitude to fundraise.

This report pushed me over the edge to Onorato.

Also, there is no excuse for this $400,000 number.

John Callahan, who’s running for congress in my district (PA-15), raised $345K last quarter starting almost halfway through.

That was for congress. Hoeffel literally has access to approximately nine million more donors than Callahan does and only raised $55K more.

Nine million!

Joey, this is a sign. It is time to stop living off the backs of hardworking taxpayers and go find a real job in the private sector.

Rylock-
Does John Callahan have 4 primary rivals?

Progressives are not the slightest bit excited by Onorato. Once they become aware of Hoeffel’s candidacy, I think Joe’s next quarter will be significantly better.

Hoeffel has some hard work ahead of him, but in a 5-way race, the strategy is very different than a two-man race.

I hate to admit that Hoeffel has a better than even chance of winning this primary. I’m an Onorato guy who here in the southeast has to endure all this talk about how progressive Hoeffel is. That will play well on this side of the state and lets face it Hoeffel is really only known in southeast pa. Onorato has already recieved endorsements from Mike Gerber Daylin Leach (how is the standard bearer for the progressives) and Mike Murphy. I even attended both Hoeffel and Onorato fundraising events a week apart from each other and the difference in crowd was noticeable. Not to mention the number of elected officials at each. Wagner will take votes from Onorato in the west and Hoeffel will take votes here in the southeast but Onorato is the only one I’ve seen with the money and the machine already in place. We’ll see.

Please let our prosecutor have Onorato. They say voters only remember three things in the voting booth. They will remember that Onorato raised taxes on working people. They will remember that Onorato presided over the boondoggle one mile, five hundred million dollar tunnel to nowhere. They will remember that his campaign donors are receiving no bid government contracts. And our prosecutor will waltz to victory. Huzzah!

Sidekick-
I was at both those events.

Despite Leach’s endorsement of Onorato, it’s pretty clear that if had Hoeffel gotten into the race earlier, Hoeffel would have gotten that particular endorsement.

Onorato is on the wrong side of history on the gay marriage issue.
His “pledge” to neither rollback nor advance women’s reproductive rights by vetoing changes in either direction is not palatable for progressive Dems, and is again moving against the stream.

He’s an NRA, gun-loving guy who (despite his claims of having the gravitas to get a listen from the NRA types) is not going to help advance gun control legislation in Philly.

While Onorato would be better than Corbett for Dems, he’s effectively a regressive Republican on social issues.

If Wagner splits the western PA vote, Hoeffel has a shot. (Still an up hill battle for Hoeffel, but he’s got a potential path to victory.)

GOPHawk-
You keep talking up Onorato’s negatives. Since Onorato’s an outsider and unknown to the SE, I can’t assess how much actual resentment there is for him on those issues.
I think with $6 million in the bank, Onorato can find enough dirt on Corbett to fill his campaign advertising allotment.

Hoeffel is a left wing Marxist hack. Sorry Joe – wrong country

Delco Dan-
Mixing Kool-aid with your tea-party?

David Diano, my opponent, the only things that will be on the table in November are corruption and taxes. Our prosecutor could not ask for a better opponent than Onorato.
Go back and look at the 2009 Jersey race with Corzine versus a prosecutor. You will see a replay in 2010 in Pa. It is the ‘prosecutor gambit’ which is a standard move for the GOP since the year Gimmel whether it carries the name of Dick Thornburgh, Rudy Giuliani, Bill Weld or any of the dozens of other successful GOP lawmen who have won executive office.
I suspect that we will be treated to indictments coming from the third AG grand jury out West which has not been heard from yet. Wonder who will be wearing shiny bracelets when that grand jury acts? Remember that the NJ arrests all happened in August, long after the prosecutor had ‘officially’ left office. I think we will have similar timing with Corbett ‘officially’ handing public corruption cases off to his career prosecutors.
In chess, you have to see the game ahead. The prosecutor gambit forces the play in a clear direction and it will not be pretty for your side especially if you walk into the trap with a taxer like Onorato.

GOPHawk-
It’s going to be jobs, the economy, health care and a referendum on Obama.

Giuliani never got above Mayor.

Corbett runs the risk of being accused of selective and political prosecution if there aren’t enough GOP indictments. And if there are GOP case, at some point they may trace back to him, by association.

However, “corruption” doesn’t put food on the table. And reducing taxes doesn’t mean anything to someone without a job (or taxes). You can’t fix the roads and bridges with tax cuts, and tax giveaways to mining interests.

There’s nothing wrong with taxes if people are getting services and value for their dollars.

Corruption puts a prosecutor on the front page everytime he gets a plea. See the news today about the twelve disciples of Veon and DeWeese making their pleas on the front page tomorrow.

I forget the movie, Mr. Diano, but to quote from it “I’m the one telling you the way it is.”

The media laps up this prosecutor stuff and that is why corruption will be one of two issues along with taxes. You may be right that people do and ought to care about other things but the media won’t resist the old catnip of corruption and taxes.

It is very true that being Attorney General is getting Tom Corbett a TON of free publicity – he’s on the front page basically every week. At this point, he doesn’t even need to actively campaign (other than raise funds).

The question is, will Mr. Corbett actually have to enter campaign mode for the primary? Or will GOP primary voters simply give him a pass on his lack of a platform and give him the nomination based solely on his statewide name recognition?

It’s always difficult to take down an Attorney General when they move towards higher office. They’re so popular! They almost do nothing but convict people that their constituents hate.

That’s why electability is such a big factor in this primary. Any Dem is going to have difficulty against Corbett. Onorato’s got the best shot, because he’ll best be able to zone in on the economy, which is all anybody cares about.

(For Attorney General-love proof, just look at Blumenthal’s polling in CT.)

Hoeffel has almost zero support in Lehigh or Northampton County and the two people he does have are about ready to jump ship.