FH: More from the Philadelphia Inquirer, which enthusiastically endorsed Senator Arlen Specter this weekend:

For years, conservatives referred to him as a RINO – a Republican In Name Only. He earned that monicker for his willingeness to work across party lines. More than ever, Wshington needs lawmakers willing to do that.

As mentioned previously, Senator Specter enjoys the support of the President of the United States, the Vice-President of the United States, prominent Democrats from across the state of PA, virtually every reputable labor organization in PA, and now The Philadelphia Inquirer. Representative Sestak’s bid has been blessed by Barnie Frank (who, again, was chastised by the House Ethics Committee when it was discovered that his male companion was operating a prostitution ring in the congressman’s apartment), Eric Massa (the ex-congressman who now stands accused of repeatedly molesting innocent young males and subsequently attempting to bribe them), nefarious labor racketeer Wendell Young IV, etc.

If Representative Sestak’s bid holds such promise, why has he utterly failed to command the support of notable members of his own political party or major news organizations? Why have Sestak’s recent fundraising efforts been such an abysmal failure? If grassroot support for Sestak exists, why have public opinion polls never reflected such support? Why did pivotal members of Sestak’s own staff – including his Political Director and Communications Director – abandon his Senate bid MONTHS before the primary? Burning questions – questions which primary voters cannot ignore.

Obviously, The Inquirer’s endorsement of Senator Specter is yet another blow to Sestak’s already floundering campaign. It is also a clear indication that Sestak’s clamorings during the past week have not benefited him.

Bruce-
Besides the fact that Specter’s ad was a factually accurate quote of the Navy Times article, you failed to include this little tidbit from the opinion (not news) piece you selectively quoted:
“We’re not thrilled at the candidacy of Sestak for a U.S. Senate seat from Pennsylvania. Sestak is a spend-and-spend liberal from the Philadelphia suburbs. His votes in Congress have been out of sync with prevailing political sentiments in and around the Tri-County Area.”

Basically, this is part of Toomey’s supporting team going after Specter and propping up (self-inflicted) wounded-Joe, hoping to get him across the finish line. The author of the piece is a registered Republican with a nearly 100% voting record. Bruce, wake up and smell the Toomey puppets instead of seeing Specter puppets where they don’t exist.

The author’s comparison of this to the Kerry situation (and declaring it worse) is completely at odds with the facts. The Navy Times article was a contemporaneous report, prior to Sestak’s political career.

Some compelling stats from the Center for Responsive Politics’ respected site Opensecrets.org. Senator Specter has raised a whopping $15,026,781 during the 2010 cycle, of which he spent $6,517,537. Representative Sestak, by contrast, raised a paltry $3,453,024 and spent a mere $1,112,060. Compelling stats indeed – stats which (like the Inquirer endorsement) raise questions about the continued viability of Sestak’s candidacy.

Mr. Diano: I have dispatched e-mails to you and Mr. Hirschhorn. Just something I thought you both should know.

As you yourself said recently, Dave – the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Until May 18.

“As you could be anyone, or several people, I could guess you are child rapist, but you didn’t post as CR.
[...]
So you live in Philly and work for a small law firm in Media? I hope they appreciate your efforts emptying wastebaskets, sweeping floors and cleaning toilets as you try to pick up some legal lingo while you study for your G.E.D. ”

Ad hominem attacks never get anyone anywhere David. It’s amazing how, when confronted with actual facts and verifiable quotes, Specter supporters result to the most basic of instincts, MUD SLINGING! As for my job, my active caseload includes over 200 cases, including helping to draft appellant briefs to Superior Court, so I’m quite happy with my choice of profession. Oh and I’m off to law school in the fall, so no need for my GED. If you’d like a job doing those tasks I’m sure I could pass along your resume.

Wanna deal with real issues at hand? Let’s do so! If you wanna try and sling mud, well that just says everything about you and the candidate that you “support” (I place support in quotation marks because you dont seem to support Arlen as much as you just HateSestak…oh I’m sorry, I forgot to put a space there…completely a freudian slip!)

HateSestak-

On the Sunday when the states two biggest newspapers, the Philly Inquirer and the Pittsburgh Post Gazette endorse Sen. Specter, Sestak supporters point to an article, in Dubois… written as David says by a Republican. I think this pretty much sums up the Sestak campaign.

Joe’s getting alot of help from the right wing… some “principled dem”.

Cash from mellon scaife
Happy hour and propping up Toomey to moderates
Right wing press in DuBois
and the office manager in Pittsburgh is a registered republican.

This seems like a plot doesnt it?

“The reason I mention this is that during the 2006 campaign, Sestak’s management style and “poor command climate” was frequently brought up by Weldon’s supporters. Their contention was it made Sestak unfit for Congress. My reply was basically: Who cares if he is a bad boss? It would matter only to his staff, and they can walk away if they don’t like it. In a free, competitive market, the problem would be self correcting.”

Is this a quote from the Sestak Campaign? How about even a current Sestak employee? Even a supporter of Sestak? NOPE. I’ll ask Mr. Diano to authenticate this quote if he can remember…(HINT: http://padelcowatch.blogspot.com/2007/09/looking-for-few-good-men.html) The answer you gave then is the same as the answer now, “However, the staffers are civilians, not military, and certainly not stuck on a ship in the ocean or subject to court martial. They can walk away (and have).” The issue is one between employer and employee.

Also I will close with one final comment, “If you want to waste your time going after Joe, at least stick to his votes and policies. Voters are wising up to the crude GOP insinuations. ” -From David Diano, September 5, 2007 12:34 AM Its just so amazing how I have to beg him now to do the same thing!

FH-
An attack with a smiley face ? How wounded you must be. So, you work for a law firm, but are not a lawyer and haven’t even been to law school.
That’s points for me flagging you as not really a lawyer, after you tried to toss out your workplace like it was a qualification. Sounds like you are just some inexperienced kid right out of college. I’ll try to be impressioned after I finish yawning.

As for my quotes, I did once defend Joe against the connection between his poor command climate in the military vs civilian life. While in 2006, I did strongly suspect the “poor command climate” accusation to be true, I honestly (and naively) believed Joe couldn’t get away with that sh*t once he got into office because people would leave in droves. I thought Sestak was smart enough behave better, because it would become a self-correcting problem.

I was correct about how staffers would react. What I failed to realize was the additional negative impacts the turnover would have with retraining and loss of institutional knowledge, as well as leaving Sestak with the bottom of the barrel.
Also, when you combine this with Sestak’s refusal to pay many of his staff the minimum hourly wage, it’s clear that Sestak doesn’t really support workers rights nor practices what he preaches.
You are correct that the vast majority of my posts in getting Sestak elected were attacks against Weldon. Sestak had been the 3rd choice, but Lentz and Scoles pulled out leaving Sestak as the only candidate. I’d have voted for a dead cat over Weldon (and would prefer one over Sestak or Specter if could defeat Toomey). But, Specter has the best shot at beating Toomey and that overrides all other considerations.
Dems who really care about the party should not play into Toomey’s hands by helping Sestak waste more Dem $$$.

As for the stories I’ve related about Joe, they aren’t GOP insinuations, but painful examples from actual Democrats who’ve suffered at his hands.

Sestak claims about fighting “the establishment” amount to an indictment of every PA Democratic official, who supports Specter, as lacking integrity. Conversely, Dems that support Sestak are the honorable ones (like Eric Massa).

WESTPADEM6: As you noted, like The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has officially endorsed Senator Arlen Specter. “While Joe Sestak tries to portray himself as the genuine article, Arlen Specter is the real deal – with a demonstrated record of service for Pennsylvania,” The Post-Gazette declared. Ouch! And some of Sestak’s flunkeys have accused me of being harsh! The Post-Gazette called attention to a recent Quinnipiac University poll which indicated that a staggering 58% of likely Democratic voters were unfamiliar with Sestak. This figure, above all, is a testament to the utter failure of Sestak’s Senate bid. The Inquirer and Post-Gazette endorsements both come in the wake of Sestak’s contrived reaction to a Specter advertisement questioning the congressman’s credentials. Obviously, Sestak’s clamorings this week have not benefited him. Surrounding himself with veterans and dispatching a letter to the Vice-president of the United States, in fact, may have only undermined him.

The Inquirer and Post-Gazette endorsements are the death knell for Sestak’s campaign. Specter can now launch advertisements touting the Inquirer and Post-Gazette endorsements! Sestak…could introduce ads touting…uh…well…he could boast some more about his supposedly stellar military career. But that approach has not produced favorable results, has it?

FH: Your attempts to browbeat and intimidate Mr. Diano obviously are not producing results. Like Representative Sestak himself, your arsenal appears limited to coercion and strong-arm tactics. But as some have recently demonstrated to Representative Sestak and his labor racketeer allies, coercion and strong-arm tactics often backfire. Indeed, the backlash can sometimes be UNIMAGINABLY calamitous. Learn from Sestak’s example, and adopt a different strategy. Coercion and strong-arm tactics, again, seldom produce the results one expects.

Hater-
Don’t be too tough on him. FH appears to be a kid who’s still pretty wet behind the ears. Sestak’s fooled people much older and wiser (but hopefully not for too much longer).

WestDem-
Getting the two biggest papers is just the start of the rising flood waters against the beached shipwreck of the S.S. Sestak.

Gee I didn’t know using verifiable quotes, facts and asking for straight answers was considered strong arming these days. What’s that old political adage, ‘if you don’t like the answer…change the question’? Something like that? Deal in facts and substantiated quotes, period, end of sentence. If you want to deal in rumors, hyperbole and mudslinging, honestly, why even post? Unlike so many other’s here, whom you have drown out with your incessant insistence on rumor and self-flagellating congratulations, I won’t stand for your blatant hypocrisy and your republican gossip mongering.

How about instead of trying to gain points for flagging me as not a lawyer (I dont think I ever claimed I was…so do you really get points for anything there?) you answer instead whether or not my interpretation of the law is correct (it is, not that you’d care). How about admitting that its a complete contradiction in terms that you would make the same attacks that Curt Weldon made against Sestak, and think in one case its fine and the other time its out of bounds. How about dealing with the entire list of supporters on both sides instead of trotting out Eric Massa every single time you feel challenged (oh and its really creepy how HateSestak keeps using the phrase ‘fondled the genitles of young male staffers’.) Massa’s a weirdo, we all get it… but I’ll trade Massa’s endorsement of Sestak for Bush’s endorsements of Specter any day… or Santorum’s… or Cheney’s… or, well you get the idea. Diano, if you wanna go back and try and revise your history, fine… but its pretty easy to see from your previous blogging history that your beef with Sestak stems more from his refusal to help your friends get elected to local office and less from any policy issue you might have with him.

If you really cared about the issues of a progressive democrat, you’d stack the record of Arlen Specter against Sestak and realize there’s no question who actually represents the best interests of the Democratic base in PA. For every vote you supposedly have a question about with Sestak, I’ll wager I can find three Specter votes that are as conservative as they come. But then you’d just explain away all those votes by saying ‘BUT HE HAD TO! HE WAS HELD TO A CONSERVATIVE STANDARD BY THE REPUBLICAN PARTY!’ Here’s a thought for you, he was only held captive to the party so long as he wanted to enjoy that establishment support and core voters. If he really cared about what the majority of Pennsylvanians thought and cared about, he would have NEVER made those votes. But you all dont want to discuss the issues of an election. You’d rather all sit here and have the same conversation with each other every day: Since its already tomorrow, why dont I have it for you so you can allow the rest of us to have meaningful discussions. Its a play in one act, I call it, “The most lamentable comedy of Specter’s Perpetual Self-Reinforcing Machine.

“Diano: Sestak is a meanie! I heard from this guy that he once said that hes >insert rumor du jour<. Its completely true and there is no need to check up on anything…fact checking is for losers! In fact, facts are for losers too. Rumors are much better…just like the one about Joe Sestak…

HateSestak: That sounds like a completely credible story! I believe it! As the congressman's ignominious career will soon be at an end, everyone should listen to my unsubstantiated, completely vague accusations against him. He's gonna be arrested soon!

Lana: I believe everything you both have said!

HateSestak: Lana is correct in believing me! ERIC MASSA!!!!

Westpadem1: I am now going to repeat something that David Diano said yesterday…its more truthish that way…right?

Me: Hey guys, why not deal in real facts? Wouldn't that illuminate both candidate in their truest lights?

ALL: NOPE!

Diano: Sestak is going down, havent you seen all the chatter on these boards?! That equates to like a 6 bajillion vote victory for Specter! Every Sestak supporter might as well just not come out to vote on election day…theres no point anyway…since we say so!

HateSestak (offstage): FBI!!! ERIC MASSA!!!!

FH-
The stories I’ve related are verifiable. All you have to do is ask the eye witnesses to the events. In the case of Sestak do you accept eye witness testimony? or do his ex-staffers need to have him on video tape for you to accept their stories?
Just because I haven’t published names of my sources, doesn’t mean I don’t have them. I’ve offered up the names, positions, and other identifying details to Dan should he run into these people in the course of doing a Sestak story. I’m not going to violate their privacy and risk retaliation against them to satisfy some anonymous punk posting under his initials.

You’d really trade Massa’s endorsement for Bush’s or Santorum’s? Really? Well, you should march right over to Sestak’s office and suggest a Sestak + Massa ad to them, highlighting the 20 years of “honorable service” that Massa gave (on the official record, just like Sestak’s honorable record). That will really help people realize how much a person can get away with in the Navy for decades and still resign “with honor”. Great plan.

Specter’s critical stimulus vote saved the country from another Great Depression. For me, it cancels all his prior votes and wipes the slate clean. Now that he is in the Democratic party, he’ll be a lot more reliable than “Dems” like Ben Nelson and some others.

You can make fun all you want but the polls are pretty clear and consistent about how Sestak is doing. The newspaper endorsements are not going to help Sestak. Sestak’s not only trying to swim uphill, he’s facing the wrong direction.

FH-
Here’s one for you: Instead of attacking us, try explaining who you like better Sestak or Specter and why. Please include if you are a Dem or Republican, since this is a Primary contest and only Dems get to actually make the choice (though a Republican may have a preference for November).

So, David, you think Sestak’s campaign staff are “bottom of the barrel”?? Ha ha ha, some of those guys will surprise you one of these days. I’m sure they are aware of your comment (if not, they will be). Think it was only Sestak’s campaign who wouldn’t buy your crappy software?