Saturday, April 08, 2006

Speaking of splits in PA Republican party



Lisa has taken a lot of hits and the polling I know of shows her in the lead. Probably name reconition. A story in the Pocono Record spells out the differences.

HARRISBURG — Republican voters face an ideological clash in this spring's primary race to elect a new senator in the 20th District....Three of the five GOP candidates in the race clearly identify with different wings of the party.....At the same time, former Lehigh Valley congressman Pat Toomey endorsed candidate David Madeira, a Dallas chiropractor, as "the conservative in the race." Toomey emerged as a leader of the party's conservative wing during his unsuccessful challenge to U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter in 2004.

A third candidate, Russell Bigus, is forging his own set of ties. Bigus recently won an endorsement from Operation PaCleanSweep, the group that sprang up in the wake of the controversial legislative pay raise to mount an effort to unseat all incumbent lawmakers. Bigus is a school board director in Dallas.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Name recognition Schname recognition. Nobody knows Lisa Baker except the political cronies who are trying to "annoint" her Lemmond's successor. Haggerty has been on TV here in Pike county since the Nixon administration. If anybody has name recognition it's Haggerty.

LVDem said...

I always give an advantage to insiders b/c they have the ability to mobilize party resources while outsiders have to rely on a personal network and construct it. In a party primary, that difference is huge. That's not to say the inside always wins, but the built in advantage is helpful.