Looking at April 22nd, why do you think McCracken and Thompson pulled out the wins? What impact, in the end, do you think the Walker/Shaner controversy had on the race? Did Peterson’s endorsement make the difference? Would Thompson have pulled through without it? McCracken spent the least of the three Democratic candidates, but managed the win regardless. Why?
Looking ahead, what are your thoughts on the race between Thompson and McCracken? Is there any real chance the county will go Democratic for the first time since 1976? McCracken says (in the CDT):
“I think I can [win],” he said Wednesday. “With a lot of hard work and getting out and talking with the people and answering their questions, yes, I think I can.”
According to the results of the Democratic primary on Tuesday, Pennsylvanians live in two different states from a political perspective.
In the southeast quarter of the state, Barack Obama won nearly two-thirds of the vote in the city of Philadelphia. He also won comfortably in a string of counties running westward from Philadelphia to Harrisburg, including suburban Delaware and Chester Counties, Lancaster County, and Dauphin County (Harrisburg).
However, Obama did not do well enough in the southeast portion of Pennsylvania to make up for the staggering size of his losses elsewhere in the state. He lost suburban Montgomery County by a narrow margin, and in a disappointment to his campaign, he won only about 40% of the vote in a group of counties to the north of Philadelphia where he had hoped to do better, including suburban Bucks County, Berks County (Reading), Lehigh County (Allentown) and Northampton County (Bethlehem).
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton blew Obama way in almost every other county of the state (with two exceptions to be named later). She won 70% or more of the vote in almost all the counties of southwestern Pennsylvania that surround Pittsburgh, while winning 55% of the vote in Allegheny County, which contains the city of Pittsburgh. She won three-quarters of the vote in Lackawanna and Luzerne Counties of northeast Pennsylvania, containing the cities of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre.
She won 63% of the vote in northwest Pennsylvania’s Erie and Crawford Counties, making the northwest part of the state Obama’s second best region in Pennsylvania after the southeast part, despite his losing in the northwest by a large margin. Clinton won about two-thirds of the vote in most of the counties in the more rural central and northern sections of the state.
So, one state of political Pennsylvania includes the southeast region, where Obama easily won in the city of Philadelphia and split the other counties in the area with Clinton. The rest of the state is a separate political Pennsylvania, in which Clinton won every county by a very large margin, with two exceptions.
The two exceptions? They are Centre County, which includes State College and the Penn State University Park campus, and neighboring Union County, home to Bucknell University in Lewisburg. Those two counties represented an oasis to the Obama campaign on primary election night, surrounded by Clinton Country.
Secretary of the Commonwealth Pedro Cortes says voter turnout across the state should be—as he projected—a record breaking 50 percent. In Allegheny County, turn out is reported as up to 60 percent. In comparison, in 2004, Pennsylvania Primary voter turnout was 21 percent statewide, and in 2000 it was 18 percent.
For more updated voter turnout information, visit http://www.dos.state.pa.
What experience did you have casting your ballot today?
Long lines? Was turnout what you expected?
Unfamiliar names on the ballot?
Did it bother you not to get a paper receipt? Members of this local group are not happy about it.
Are you confident the vote will be fair?
Related Video: Here is a recent WPSU interview on voting rights:
Voting Rights
The 1965 Voting Rights Act, a crowning triumph of the Civil Rights Movement, enfranchised all Americans. What obstacles do we face forty-three years later? Investigate new voting regulations that could discriminate against minorities in the 2008 election.
A quick quiz: Who are John Cordisco, Jennifer Mann, Robert McCord, and Dennis Morrison-Wesley? Give up? If you are a registered Democrat, you will be choosing among those four names in the April 22 primary to be a candidate for Pennsylvania State Treasurer in November. After you register your vote for Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama for president, the ballot will ask you which of the four names listed you prefer for State Treasurer.
If you are a registered Republican, you will be offered no choices in the primary election for the statewide row offices of State Treasurer, Attorney General, and Auditor General - all candidates are running unopposed. This will accompany your opportunity to vote for a presidential candidate in a race that’s already been decided in favor of John McCain. Registered Democrats will also be offered no choices in the primary election for Attorney General or Auditor General.
Late today, Derek Walker issued a response to the charges filed against him:
“These charges are false. The entire matter is politically motivated — any thinking citizen in our area understands that charges of this nature brought 5 days before an election are clearly motivated by politics. I have never had a conversation or been questioned by the DA or any representative from his office. I am confident that the residents of our region will see this entire matter for what it is — politics at its worst.”
He also issued a statement from his ex-girlfriend, who was the subject of the allegations:
“Derek Walker and I dated for seven years. As with many long-term relationships, our breakup was very difficult and emotional. However, rumors are being circulated about what happened between Derek Walker and me and are now being used for political gain. Derek Walker and I ended our relationship in June. My family and I wish Derek the best on Election Day. Anyone who would spread such blatantly false rumors five days before an election is clearly politically motivated. Not only should they immediately stop spreading these rumors but they should also step forward and offer Derek Walker and me a public apology.”
The CDT reported today that Republican Candidate Derek Walker has been charged today with two felonies and four misdemeanors. The felony charges are for burglary and criminal trespass. Both relate to an alleged incident in which Walker spied on an ex-girlfriend.
The Walker campaign has alleged that the Shaner campaign pressured the Clearfield County District Attorney to file the charges so close to the primary. The DA has said that charges were filed simply because the investigation just concluded.
According to the CDT: “Walker said his campaign has traced anonymous letters sent to media outlets about the incident to the Shaner campaign. He also said he has not been contacted by police or questioned about the incident in the past “250 days.”
“A Shaner aide reportedly said Shaner did not initiate the letters or the police investigation.”
On April 22nd, WPSU will be hosting live, continuous coverage of the primary races on WPSU-FM and on this website. You can reply to this post with questions for two of the live radio interviews that will be featured that night.
Cynthia Berger will be interviewing Penn State political science professor (and WPSU blogger) Michael Berkman about super delegates. What are they, who are they, and why do they matter?
Cynthia will also be interviewing Penn State journalism professor (and WPSU blogger) Russ Eshleman about the state and local races at stake in the primary.
Cynthia will choose from among your questions to be asked live on WPSU-FM on April 22nd. Please keep in mind that not all questions will be asked due to time constraints.
The Barack Obama campaign has announced the Illinois Senator’s first visit to the northwest quarter of the state in this year’s primary race.
He will be holding a town hall meeting format on the Penn State Erie campus on Friday morning, April 18.
Former President Bill Clinton will also be visiting the Penn State Erie campus on the morning of Thursday, April 17, to speak on behalf of the presidential campaign of Senator Hillary Clinton. After his address, he is scheduled to visit several other cities in northwest Pennsylvania on that same day, including Warren, St. Mary’s, Brookville, Clearfield, and Lock Haven, according to the Erie Times-News
This will be Bill Clinton’s second visit to the Erie area during the primary campaign. Hillary Clinton campaigned in Erie last month at a well-attended rally.
Senator Ted Kennedy spoke on the Penn State Erie campus this past Monday on behalf of Barack Obama, making three visits from prominent national political leaders to Penn State’s campus in Erie within the same week.
As most of you probably know, outgoing 5th District Republican congressman John Peterson has endorsed Glenn Thompson’s candidacy. The question is, how much does it matter? This NPR story analyzes the importance of endorsements on the presidential level, but what about in this race? Will this propel Thompson to an easy victory on April 22nd? Will it impact your decision?
A second question: Why Thompson? Here is the main explanation we found. What do you think?
From GoErie.com: “Peterson said Friday that he took his time in endorsing a candidate in order to meet and speak with each of them. He said he also watched some of their debates, and even asked the candidates whom they would vote for if they weren’t in the race.
“They all said Glenn Thompson,” Peterson said.
Peterson said he based his endorsement in part on Thompson’s long and extensive record of community service, which includes nearly 30 years as a Boy Scout leader and 25 years as a firefighter and emergency medical technician.”
A number of internet news sources, starting with The Huffington Post, and cable television news networks are now reporting that Barack Obama made the following comments at a San Francisco fundraiser last weekend:
“But the truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there’s not evidence of that in their daily lives. You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”
Obama tried to explain and defend the comments at a campaign appearance in Indiana on Friday night, but instead his campaign needs to act fast and apologize or admit he chose a poor way to phrase his point if he wants to continue to have any chance to win in Pennsylvania on April 22.
Here is a collection of WPSU’s recent election related videos.
Voting Rights
The 1965 Voting Rights Act, a crowning triumph of the Civil Rights Movement, enfranchised all Americans. What obstacles do we face forty-three years later? Investigate new voting regulations that could discriminate against minorities in the 2008 election.
Former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge’s name has been cropping up in news stories assessing potential running mates for Republican John McCain.
Two important reasons he might not be selected:
• Ridge is pro-choice, which would provide even more grist for conservatives who don’t trust McCain as being conservative enough on issues such as tax cuts and immigration – even though McCain is not pro-choice.
“Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, campaigning for Obama at Penn State on Friday, noted that Pennsylvania has registered about 250,000 new Democrats since last fall’s election and ahead of the state’s April 22 primary.
Durbin said about half of them were independents and Republicans moving into the Democratic ranks. The county’s data through Friday showed that, since the start of the year, Democrats have gained 5,068 new registrations while Republicans have lost 248.”
All of these new voters—and new democrats—will also be asked to vote in the congressional race. What is driving these trends? And what impact will that have on the primary, and the general election?
New York Times politics writer Matt Bai recently wrote a piece in the Sunday Magazine in which he makes a provocative case about what he calls the “real racial divide” between Obama and Clinton supporters. I have excerpted the major parts of his case below. Do you buy his argument? Does it hold true in Pennsylvania?
Man, it’s exciting. We have Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama clawing each other’s eyes out in hopes of winning the Democratic presidential nomination and the right to challenge John McCain in November.
As most Pennsylvania political analysts would expect, the Philadelphia region is Obama’s strongest in the state, according to the poll.
Clinton leads in all other areas of the state, but Obama’s next best regions after the Philadelphia area are South Central Pennsylvania (Harrisburg) and northwest Pennsylvania (Erie). The northwest PA poll results are likely to change by this weekend due to Clinton’s recent visit to the region - Obama has not yet announced a visit to this part of the state, though he probably will soon.
Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama visited Penn State on Sunday March 30. He spoke before a crowd of approximately 22, 000. This is his entire speech.
To hear what undecided voters made of his speech, check out this feature.
Watch Bill Clinton make the case for his wife’s candidacy in this speech from March 27th at Penn State. The former president passionately lays out Hillary Clinton’s stances on the most pressing issues of the campaign.
You can hear what undecided voters made of his speech in this feature.
Take out a printed map of the state of Pennsylvania. Draw a line east to west through the state that passes through State College. Draw another line north to south that also passes through State College. You have just divided the state into four quarters. Check out the northwest quarter of the state of Pennsylvania. That is the part of the state which Senator Barack Obama’s bus tour will be completely bypassing; it is the part of the state where Obama has yet to appear during this primary election campaign; it is the part of the state where no prominent supporter or surrogate for Obama has yet appeared.
Join WPSU for a public conversation on the issues facing residents in the 5th Congressional District. Patty Satalia will lead a discussion with a panel of experts on the issues facing voters in this highly competitive race. Audience members will have an opportunity to take WPSU’s 5th District Candidate Quiz to begin learning more about the candidates in this race.
Want to tell someone else about this event? Here is an ecard you can forward.
Some people may be surprised or even upset that Matt Shaner has already spent close to a million dollars on his campaign for Pennsylvania’s 5th Congressional district. After all, we haven’t even had the primary yet. But Shaner understands that in the Pennsylvania 5th, it may be all over on primary day.
CQ Politics, known for their extensive coverage of congressional politics, has rated the third district of Pennsylvania as one of the thirty most vulnerable Republican seats in the US House of Representatives for this year’s election.
I can tell you with a pretty good amount of certainty whether a Democrat or Republican will be elected governor of Pennsylvania in 2010 – two years from now.
But ask me to predict whom Pennsylvanians will choose for president this November, Republican John McCain or either Democrat Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama, I won’t venture a guess.
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