The ‘Matthews effect,’ the 13th District and the decline of the MontCo GOP

The Montgomery County GOP has endorsed pEarly comments on the vote have emphasized the so-called a href="http://writemarsh.blogspot.com/2010/02/mathews-effect-claims-its-latest-victim.html" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://writemarsh.blogspot.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwritemarsh.blogspot.com%2F2010%2F02%2Fmathews-effect-claims-its-latest-victim.html','Matthews+Effect')" target="_blank">Matthews Effect,…

February 12, 2010 at 2:10 pm | Comments (3)

5 fun facts from the 3rd quarter

A few days after third quarter campaign finance reports were published, here’s a handful of interesting items that jumped out at us.

1. Why spend money when you’ve barely started running? Republican 7th District candidate Pat Meehan, only 16 days into his campaign when the third quarter closed Sept. 30, didn’t have to. The former U.S. Attorney spent a paltry $607, full story

October 19, 2009 at 11:00 am | Comments (1)

Dachowski brings civility to the health care town hall

After attending Joe Sestak’s health care town hall in Philadelphia a few weeks ago, I was no stranger at seeing the signs “Healthcare Now,” which meant ACORN and MoveOn.org were in the audience. It also meant a contentious night with call-outs and raucous behavior was in store. And, for a candidate to announce his campaign in a crowd this rude and rowdy, I applaud Damian Dachowski for trying to bring a modicum of civility to…

September 8, 2009 at 12:57 pm | Comments (13)

Reflections from a day of GOP events

For some reason, every Republican event that I was invited to this year was scheduled for last Thursday, providing a flurry of choices during an otherwise slow season. I chose to attend Jim Gerlach’s fundraiser (without paying) in Malvern and Congressional candidate Damian Dachowski’s campaign event/health care town hall meeting in Huntingdon Valley.

Between them I saw a lot of what is right about the Republican Party right now… and something about the challenges it…

September 8, 2009 at 10:44 am | Comments (2)

Tea parties, health care riots don’t help Republican cause

I’ve been pA case in point are a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/08/us/politics/08townhall.html?scp=4&sq=health%20care%20reform&st=cse" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.nytimes.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2009%2F08%2F08%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2F08townhall.html%3Fscp%3D4%26amp%3Bsq%3Dhealth%2520care%2520reform%26amp%3Bst%3Dcse','angry+confrontations')" target="_blank"angry confrontations/a at Congressional recess…

August 10, 2009 at 7:04 am | Comments (2)

Dachowski aims to give Schwartz a run for her money

I have some idea what it’s like to run a long-shot race against a well-funded incumbent, so when I met pDachowski, a dentist and a previous candidate for county coroner, struck me as personable—one might even say charming—and very much aware of the challenges…

July 22, 2009 at 7:00 am | Comments (2)

Schwartz has $2.5M on hand; opponent less than $10K

Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz (D-13) continues to raise money at a steady clip, collecting about $464,000 over the last three months and ending the quarter with more than $2.5 million on hand, according to campaign finance data.

The only Republican who has said he may oppose her, Damian Dachowski, has less than $10,000 on hand.

Schwartz has raised more than $800,000 since easily winning reelection last year. Dachowski has raised more than $13,000 to date.

full story

July 16, 2009 at 9:51 am | Comments (4)

Pulling teeth in the 13th…

Still getting back into the swing of things after a death in my family and my recent Italy trip, so I haven’t had much time for interviews just yet.  But I was intrigued to see that Republican Damian Dachowski, a Huntingdon Valley dentist,

June 17, 2009 at 9:09 am | Comments (1)

A MontCo dentist looks to challenge Schwartz

A dentist from Huntingdon Valley says he’s likely to challenge Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz (D-13) next year, going up against a popular and well-entrenched incumbent in what is sure to be a steep uphill battle.

Damian Dachowski, who has lived his whole life in the 13th Congressional District and has his own dental practice in Horsham, had not officially declared his candidacy. But he has filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission, launched a campaign Web site and is looking for support in the district. Even as he insisted his decision wasn’t final in an interview with pa2010.com, he spoke as if it was.

“I’m running for congress because government just seems to be going in the wrong direction, and Americans are looking for new leadership to fix a system that’s broken,” Dachowski said.

June 15, 2009 at 11:39 am | Comments (1)