Sestak did run an excellent campaign. As I commented before, his strategy of saving all his bullets till the last moment was a perfect for an electorate that was not engaged in the primaries until the very last moments.

I worked the polls on Tuesday, though, and the Statement I heard from Democrats over and over again was, “I do not care about any of the candidates or races, I just want to vote against Arlen Specter.”

Brian O’Connor
http://www.RedDogReport.com

Dan-
Those counties may well have been more anti-Specter than pro-Joe.

I suspect we could have put YOUR name on the ballot and you would have done well there.

Joe Knows Pennsylvania Thats why he won

DD—can’t you just give sestak his due…he beat your man…you called it wrong…your hate blined you…or maybe it was the musty basement smell or cheetoh crumbs or tinfoil hat interference

Joe doesn’t know Pennsylvania, he hasn’t lived here since 1971. Everybody was talking about his anti-Specter commercial where his party switch could help him get RE-Elected. Brilliant commercial, single bullet, goodbye Arlen.

sick-
I underestimated the stupidity of the electorate. I give Sestak credit for working hard. I’ve never denied he was a hard worker.
However, contrary to your view, Joe doesn’t walk on water or crap rainbows like the unicorn sticker on your Hello Kitty diary.

Sestak’s hard work has been magnified by a lot of luck of being in the right place at the right time, and some back luck for his opponents.
Weldon got raided by the FBI weeks before the election.
Specter f*cked up by talking about being reelected. He should have said, “I switched parties to continue serving the people of Pennsylvania”. Since that requires being reelected, Specter DID put the horse before the cart, but everybody focused on the horse, and not the cart.
But, don’t say I’m attacking Sestak by pointing out the vote was more anti-Specter. Sestak himself kept making the point that Specters low approval numbers convinced him to take on Arlen.
Specter WON SE PA which was familiar with both candidates. Specter lost where he was not well liked and Sestak was not well known.

David-
According to the Politico map, Specter won Philadelphia by an overwhelming margin, but lost Delaware, Bucks, Montgomery, Berks, Lehigh and Lancaster Counties.
http://www.politico.com/2010/maps/#/Senate/2010/PA
Can you find me another county where Sestak did not prevail?

Hey C Guiney,

Sestak won 64 of 67 counties, including the four Philly suburbs that were supposed to be Specter’s base (MontCo was, if I recall correctly, pretty darn close).

I’m writing this comment away from my desk, but if memory serves me right, the only counties Specter won were Philadelphia, Dauphin and Lackawanna.

Hope that helps.

Thanks as always for commenting.

Dan Hirschhorn

C Guiney-
My point was that in the SE, (philly, bucks, chester, delco and montco)
Specter won 180,032 to 160,816 (52.82% to 47.18%)
and Philly had something like 20% turnout instead of 25% like other parts.
Even if you include Lehigh and Lancaster, Specter still

The Western Dems are more conservative, so Sestak’s running as the “real, liberal Democrat” shouldn’t have played well out West, unless it was actually a rejection of Specter and Philly. (Joe’s from the area, but not linked to Philly like Specter.)

Dan – Thanks for the reply.

David- I was just looking at the Politico map, and only found one county in SEPA (Phila) that favored Specter.
Though I have no data to support this hunch, I think that the Phila vote was more due to the efforts of the Phila Dem machine than a rejection of Sestak by individual voters.

C Guiney-
I’m not denying that Specter won only a few counties.
But if you take the 5 or 7 counties I mentioned as a whole block, Specter won that SE grouping overall.
Philly is actually the size of several counties, so merely looking at as a “county count” of “one” is like comparing a plum to an apple.

Imagine if Joe hadn’t run! There would have been no primary. Can’t expect Democrats to vote for a candidate who has been a Republican for over 40 years. The commercial or not, Arlen was a political opportunist and had been a Republican for way too many years to be taken seriously by Democrats. He’s done too many things to too many people too. Even on primary day, he was sliming away sending emails around stating he had the better shot at beating Toomey. That was a lie since Joe always had a much better chance of beating Toomey as the polls predicted.

Love Sestak-
Yes, imagine Specter with over $10 million and undamaged by Sestak’s $4 million in attacks, and capturing the middle with a united Dem party behind him.
Imagine the 7th district so secure in Dem hands that Meehan wouldn’t even try to run.
Imagine holding onto the state house.

I Think you are Hallucinating now David Seek Help

DD—again…the cheetoh crumbs or the musty smell of the basement or the tinfoil hat…I think C Guiney has it right…block out you dislike of Sestka because he won’t buy your product…Joe ain’t perfect but he will be the next senator from PA…tuck the tinfoil in yourn ears and you’ll reaklize that PA is not toomey conservative…

DD: Specter didn’t win 5 or 7, he won three. That’s all.

Specter never would have had a united Democratic party behind him in Nov. Dave. He isn’t a uniter,he was a devisive candidate. Joe Sestak will have a united Democratic party behind him.

Fresh air-
Counting by counties is dumb and artificial. Philly is several times the size of Delco or Montco. In the 7-county combined SE region, Specter won over all. Montco was VERY close (about 1,000 votes).
This is where BOTH candidates were best known.

Bill-
I agree that Specter would have trouble uniting because Joe wouldn’t help. But if Joe never ran, and had supported Arlen from the beginning, a united party would be facing Toomey.

As if Dave Diano knows anything about uniting Democrats, after having spent a few years on the defamation of character of a leading Dem.

DD – guess your remark about leaving this all behind was a big lie too. Or are you still just defending yourself? As I told you, you can’t stop. Can you say obsessive-compulsive?

Larry Chrzan in Haverford Twp

Why are you bothering hiding behind an initial?

I was planning on walking away after discussing the ramifications of Sestak’s primary win, some postmortem election analysis, and continuing to defend myself. My http://AdmiralSleestak.com/ domain was all set to expire on Thursday. Then you, and a few others, demanded that I take it down or else.

Well, you pretty much threw gasoline on dying embers and goaded me into renewing it. (Good job at getting the outcome you didn’t want, by doing the one thing guaranteed to make me renew the domain: threatening me)

Now, I’m just hanging around a little longer to piss off you and a few other Sestak drones. Before, I was hoping to shed some light on who Sestak is and prevent a bad choice for the Dem nominee.
Now, this shipwreck has sailed, and the Democratic party is stuck with Sestak. I’m just having fun screwing with you guys for a while, and teaching you a lesson about the ramifications trying to bully someone.

Larry, you are embarrassing yourself even more than you usually do in committee. BTW, how come you didn’t post a fawning announcement about Sestak’s primary win on your PA7Watch site? You haven’t posted there since Joe’s win over the underfunded paper tiger, Craig Williams.

Are you going to change the site and replace Sestak’s picture with Lentz’s? Are you going to post under your name?
The domain expires 21-Jun-2010.
Are you going to even bother keeping it, since it’s been a dead-site for a year and half?

Dave, I am offended about your stupidity of the electorate comment. For the record, I did not vote for Sestak. I demand an apology!!!!!