Pa. Delegation’s take on the looming shutdown

The federal government is getting close to possibly shutting down for the first time since 1996. If President Obama and Congressional leaders cannot come to an agreement full story

April 7, 2011 at 12:49 pm | Comments (5)

LEFTOVERS: A guv debate, more Senate ads, a Callahan spot, cops for Fitz

Looks like we’ll actually be getting two more gubernatorial debates before Election Day.

One more has been added to the schedule, and this one is set to go down Oct. 18. It’ll be aired on the local ABC affiliate in Philadelphia, giving Republican Tom Corbett and Democrat Dan Onorato what could potentially be their biggest debate audience of the campaign.

That debate will come just two days after the candidates have their second debate, a…

October 6, 2010 at 5:07 pm | Comments (3)

GOPers back Murphy’s reelection bid

Two Bucks County Republicans have endorsed Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8), giving the embattled Democrat some badly-needed bipartisan cred as he faces a potentially perilous rematch against former Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick.

Former Riegelsville Borough Mayor Tood Myers and current Nockamixon Township Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Nancy Janyszeski both threw their support behind Murphy in statements Wednesday. Their endorsements came as most polls show Fitzpatrick holding a lead against Murphy, who unseated him after one term in…

October 6, 2010 at 11:12 am | Comments (81)

More on that 8th District poll

When we reported on pWell, we recently got our hands on much more data from the poll, which was commissioned by a liberal-leaning veterans’ organization and a labor union—groups that obviously favor Murphy./p
pWhile it’s always a question how pollsters select and weight their samples of likely voters, the methodology by Harstad Strategic Research appears to be more than Kosher. The questions aren’t designed to sway respondents one way or another. Others questioned the results because they came from a Democratic poll firm, commissioned by Democratic-leaning groups. But that’s the nature of all internal polling, and we’re in the business of reporting these results./p
pAnd while our headline appeared to peeve some people by describing the poll as “third-party,” that description is only meant to imply that neither campaign commissioned the survey itself./p
pThis isn’t to say the poll is right or wrong. It found a more narrow margin in the race than any public or private poll reported to date./p
pBut it’s legit./p
pYou can check out a href="http://www.pa2010.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/9-29-Harstad-Poll-Memo.pdf" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.pa2010.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pa2010.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F10%2F9-29-Harstad-Poll-Memo.pdf','the+poll+memo+here')" target="_blank">the poll memo here, and the full

October 1, 2010 at 8:43 am | Comments (16)

New Murphy ad keeps up the outsourcing charge

Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8) continues to make outsourcing a key pillar of his TV advertising campaign, with a new charging that Republican opponent Mike Fitzpatrick’s policies led to the shipping of American jobs overseas.

The new 30-second spot, unveiled Tuesday, is Murphy’s second of the campaign. He has been advertising heavily in a tough Bucks County race, with most polls showing Fitzpatrick, the one-term congressman who Murphy knocked off in 2006, holding a lead.

In…

September 28, 2010 at 12:31 pm | Comments (24)

Third-party poll finds Murphy up narrowly

Two groups say a poll they commissioned has found Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8) holding a slight edge in his rematch against Republican Mike Fitzpatrick.

The survey commissioned by the Service Employees International Union’s and Vote Vets found Murphy winning 49 percent of the 8th District vote, just more than Fitzpatrick’s 46 percent. With just five percent of likely voters undecided, the results make the race essentially a dead heat. A three-point lead is better than…

September 28, 2010 at 6:00 am | Comments (13)

Fitzpatrick up big in new poll

The first public poll taken in the 8th Congressional District this cycle has bad news for incumbent Democrat Patrick Murphy—he’s trailing big against Republican Mike Fitzpatrick, the man he knocked out of office in 2006.

The Franklin & Marshall College survey released Thursday found Fitzpatrick leading by 14 points among likely voters, 49 percent to 35 percent. That’s a leader larger than the ones documented recently by both candidates’ internal polling. Fifteen percent of likely…

September 23, 2010 at 9:57 am | Comments (25)

Labor’s mailers target Toomey, House hopefuls

The next round of organized labor’s big direct-mail campaign is zeroing in on Republican Senate candidate Pat Toomey and five GOP House candidates.

The AFL-CIO mailers, obtained by pa2010.com ahead of their formal release Monday morning, are part of pThe direct-mailers, part of a campaign that includes more than 2 million mail pieces that will hit homes across the country, hew to the familiar Democratic attack lines this cycle. The mailer targeting Toomey says he “profited while working families struggled.” The pieces targeting 8th District Republican Mike Fitzpatrick and 10th District Republican Tom Marino depict an elderly union couple saying: “We worked hard. We did everything we were supposed to do. Now Mike Fitzpatrick wants to change the rules.”/p
pOther mailers targeting Mike Kelly in the 3rd District, Pat Toomey in the 7th District and Tim Burns in the 12th District accuse the GOP nominees of pledging to protect tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas. The attack refers to the Americans for Tax Reform pledge that a plethora of candidates have signed. It doesn’t actually pledge those candidates to protect such tax breaks as a rule, but the conservative group has said that some measures which would end the tax breaks would also violate the pledge./p
pa href="http://www.pa2010.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/PA-SEN-Toomey-neg-2-FINAL.pdf" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.pa2010.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pa2010.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F09%2FPA-SEN-Toomey-neg-2-FINAL.pdf','Click+here+to+see+the+mailer+targeting+Toomey.')" target="_blank"Click here to see the mailer targeting Toomey./a/p
pa href="http://www.pa2010.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/AFL1039_PA031.pdf" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.pa2010.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pa2010.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F09%2FAFL1039_PA031.pdf','Click+here+to+see+the+mailer+targeting+Kelly.')" target="_blank">Click here to see the mailer targeting Kelly.

pa href="http://www.pa2010.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/AFL1084_PA081.pdf" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.pa2010.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pa2010.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F09%2FAFL1084_PA081.pdf','Click+here+to+see+the+mailer+targeting+Fitzpatrick.')" target="_blank"Click here to see the mailer targeting Fitzpatrick./a/p
pa href="http://www.pa2010.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/AFL1084_PA101.pdf" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.pa2010.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pa2010.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2010%2F09%2FAFL1084_PA101.pdf','Click+here+to+see+the+mailer+targeting+Carney.')" target="_blank">Click here to see the mailer targeting Carney.

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September 20, 2010 at 9:09 am | Comments (0)

Murphy’s first ad hits Fitzpatrick on jobs

Facing a rematch with the man he bounced out of Congress four years ago, Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8) is using his first TV ad to argue that Republican Mike Fitzpatrick never looked out for working-class voters in the first place.

“As a congressman, Mike Fitzpatrick took care of everyone but you,” Murphy says in the 30-second spot unveiled by his campaign Tuesday.

Political insiders and forecaster increasingly see a tight race in the Bucks County…

September 14, 2010 at 10:52 am | Comments (26)

Fitzpatrick’s first ad recalls cancer survival

Shortly after he was bounced out of office in 2006, Republican Mike Fitzpatrick was diagnosed with colon cancer. As he seeks to recapture the seat he lost in the 8th Congressional District, Fitzpatrick is using his first TV ad to share his story of surviving that cancer.

“You get a new perspective on life, when you almost lose it,” a narrator says in the 30-second spot. “A cancer survivor, Mike Fitzpatrick gives thanks for every…

September 13, 2010 at 10:18 am | Comments (20)