Rendell this week joined the Obama administration in telling liberals to buck up before the midterm elections, and leave their malaise at the door.

“This isn’t about President Obama,” Rendell said late Monday on MSNBC. “It’s about whether the Democratic Party, not perfect, but certainly bent on trying to preserve theories in government and progressive practices, is going to be in charge of the Congress or the Republican Party. And it’s not the Republican Party of old. This is a scary Republican Party.”

To liberals dissatisfied with the president, Rendell had a simple message: “We ought to get over it.”

“If we’ve got some issues with President Obama,” he said, “save them for another day.”

Meanwhile, Republicans are making hay of the fact that Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11) isn’t exactly engaging reporters and the larger public with gusto. Like many incumbents, he didn’t do much of the way in town hall meetings over the summer. Now, he’s got the press at arm’s length.

The first indication of this came from The Times-Tribune, which reported the other day that “efforts to interview the congressman this week about the [health care] law were unsuccessful because his re-election campaign declined to make him available. Campaign spokesman Ed Mitchell said allowing one reporter to interview Mr. Kanjorski weekly on issues would require the congressman to take time out of his busy schedule to grant other reporters’ requests to discuss issues.”

In other words, “if we talk to one of you, we’ve got to talk to all of you.”

It’s not exactly an attitude that will endear reporters to any elected official. Then we saw this article in Politico about the “year of the missing candidate.” In it, Kanjorski found enough time to talk with a reporter to say he’s avoiding town halls because he doesn’t want “nuts to hit me with a camera.”

“I’m not going to arm my opponent with a baseball bat,” he said.

And Republican Pat Meehan is playing up his anti-corruption credentials in a new Web video. The 7th District hopeful and former U.S. Attorney has made his days as a crime-fighter a cornerstone of his campaign against Democrat Democrat Bryan Lentz.

With that in mind, the three-and-a-half-minute video serves as something of a mini-documentary of Meehan’s past as a prosecutor, both as U.S. Attorney and Delaware County District Attorney.

The highlight of this, of course, is the corruption case Meehan’s office spearheaded against former state Senator Vince Fumo, now in prison. Meehan resigned as U.S. Attorney before the case went to trial because he was exploring a run for governor. But he got props for moving the case forward at the early stages.

Check out the video below.

Democratic incumbents Kathy Dahlkemper, Chris Carney and Paul Kanjorski are all among those targeted by the ads, which are virtually identical to previous radio spots run by the group. Recently-filed campaign finance data indicates that Americans United for Life is spending about $12,000 on the ad campaign against Dahlkemper. The ads continue a campaign by the group to paint the newly enacted health care law as an expansion of taxpayer funding for abortions.

“The life of an innocent child may not matter to Congresswoman Dahlkemper,” the ad says, “but here in Pennsylvania life counts, and Congresswoman Dahlkemper’s vote has consequences.”

Independent fact-checkers have repeatedly pushed back against claims that the health care law expanded taxpayer funding for abortions, prompting Americans United for Life to come out with its own memo rebutting fact-checkers.

The radio ads coincide with endorsements for some of the same incumbents by the anti-abortion group Democrats for Life of America. The group announced its support for both Dahlkemper and Kanjorski this week.

“Congresswoman Dahlkemper has proven her commitment to protecting life at all stages and I am confident that we can continue to count on her to stand up for what is right in the U.S. House,” Kristen Day, the group’s executive director, said in a statement. “Her leadership has proven her commitment to protecting life and preventing federal funds from being used for abortion. We value her leadership and friendship.”

Click here to listen to the ad against Dahlkemper.

The National Republican Congressional Committee unveiled the three new spots Monday morning. Two target Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper (D-3) and Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11), vulnerable incumbents who have already been the subject of NRCC TV spots. But the ad against Carney marks the first time the national party has gone after the northeast Pennsylvania Democrat on TV this cycle.

See all three ads below.

Kanjorski’s campaign tries to frame the 30-second spot as a response to Barletta by pulling a screen shot from Barletta’s latest ad—but it’s hard to deny that Kanjorski, armed with a bigger war chest, has set the advertising tone in the race between the two bitter rivals. The new ad continues that, rehashing statistics about the unemployment rate in the northeast Pennsylvania city and budget problems that have afflicted it.

“You gonna give him a promotion and a pay raise?” the ad asks.

See the ad below.

The National Association for Realtors’ political action committee spent almost $530,000 on the ad buy, according to campaign finance data. It comes as both parties are heavily investing in the northeast Pennsylvania district, with Republican Lou Barletta mounting his third challenge against Kanjorski in eight years.

Video of any TV spots were not available on the group’s Web site Friday morning. Kanjorski has a significant hand in national housing policy as chair of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises.

The race is currently No. 2 on the pa2010.com Congressional Power Rankings.

The state’s AFL-CIO rolled out its latest mail pieces Monday, the third week in a row it’s hitting up homes across Pennsylvania. The new mail pieces, targeting Senate candidate Pat Toomey and six GOP House candidates, paint Republican hopefuls as friends of Wall Street who want to outsource American jobs.

They err on at least one count, the same count that has tripped up Democrats for months: As we’ve noted before, signing the Americans for Tax Reform pledge does not automatically make you a supporter of tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas.

Anyway, you can check out all the latest mail pieces for yourself. Click here for the one targeting Toomey. And here are the ones targeting Mike Kelly, Pat Meehan, Mike Fitzpatrick, Tom Marino, Lou Barletta and Tim Burns.

Meanwhile, here comes another surrogate for Democrat Manan Trivedi. Michael Dukakis, that former Massachusetts governor and presidential candidate who looked bad in an Army tanker, is headlining a fundraiser for Trivedi’s 6th District campaign Thursday in Philadelphia. The invitation we got a hold of says it’s going down early in the evening at the fancy Water Works restaurant, with a minimum $100 contribution. Folks on the host committee include prominent Democratic fundraisers Mark Aronchick and Ken Weinstein.

And lastly, the folks over at Democrat Bryan Lentz’s campaign have been having fun with some video from Lentz’s debate last week against Republican Pat Meehan. Maybe we went a little easy on Meehan in our coverage, because friend-of-the-site Bill Bender wrote (accurately) in The Daily News that “Lentz was clearly the superior debater Tuesday, delivering concise answers, while Meehan, sweating heavily, often fell back on generalities and stumbled through his closing statement.”

Anyway, the Lentz folks put together something of a brief highlight reel, modeled off those very memorable “Priceless” MasterCard ads. We’re not sure where Lentz’s people got their cash figures, and they probably won’t match up with campaign finance data—but hey, it’s a fun watch.

Team Meehan wasn’t laughing.

“For weeks now, Bryan Lentz has shown signs of a desperate and panicked candidate,” Meehan campaign spokeswoman Virginia Davis said. “All he is trying to do is distract voters from his support of Nancy Pelosi and the failed policies coming out of Washington.”

Check out the video below.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s first two TV ads, obtained by pa2010.com ahead of their formal release Monday afternoon, target Republicans Mike Kelly and Lou Barletta. Kelly is running against freshman Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper (D-3), while Barletta is challenging longtime incumbent Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11) for the third time in eight years.

The 30-second spot hitting Kelly continues the Democratic strategy of labeling the Butler car dealer a “millionaire” who looks out for other millionaires. The ad against Barletta criticizes his governance as the mayor of Hazleton.

See both ads below. They will be fact-checked later as part of pa2010.com‘s AD WATCH series.

The National Republican Congressional Committee is up with two new TV ads targeting Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper (D-3) and Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11). The 30-second spots follow ads the GOP has already run against the two well-funded incumbents.

The ad against Dahlkemper fires back at a TV ad her campaign ran that was called “misleading” by FactCheck.org. The ad against Kanjorski takes broader swipes at his votes supporting Democratic policies.

Kanjorski’s race against Lou Barletta and Dahlkemper’s contest against Mike Kelly are rated No. 2 and No. 3, respectively, on the pa2010.com Congressional Power Rankings.

See both ads below. They will be fact-checked later as part of pa2010.com‘s AD WATCH series.

A poll by the newspaper found Barletta leading Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11) by 11 points, 43 percent to 32 percent. Marino holds a smaller four-point edge against Congressman Chris Carney (D-10), 40 percent to 36 percent.

Both surveys were taken from relatively small sample sizes, yielding large margins of error. But they reflect a generally positive environment for Republicans in the region, especially in the conservative-leaning 10th District. Republicans hope Carney and Kanjorski will prove two of their most vulnerable targets.

A quarter of likely voters in both districts are undecided, according to the poll. The margin of error was about 6.5 percent in both polls.

In Barletta’s latest TV ad, which began airing late last week, he sits at a diner counter and says Congressman Paul Kanjorski’s (D-11) “negative campaign doesn’t surprise me, or them.”

“He’s been in Washington so long,” Barletta says, “and become so out of touch that he has lot sight of the reality that we face here every day.”

Facing a stiff challenge from the same man he’s dispatched twice already, Kanjorski’s TV campaign has mostly focused on negative messaging of Barletta. The northeast Pennsylvania race is currently No. 2 on the pa2010.com Congressional Power Rankings.

See the latest ad below.