Daily Kos predicting Toomey will win [View All]

[RamboLiberal]

And I agree with him - I think Joe Hoeffel will have a helluva time beating him. Maybe I'm being pessismistic. The DNC needs to get behind Hoeffel if Toomey is the candidate.

PA-Sen: Toomey will win tomorrow
by kos
Mon Apr 26th, 2004 at 18:34:24 EDT

Damn. It's been a while since we've had a nailbitter of an election, but tomorrow's Pennsylvania Republican primary election is fitting the bill.
SurveyUSA has tracked Toomey's rise -- a rise that seemed all but inevitable when I first wrote about this race. It was clear from the beginning that Toomey was putting together one of the great campaigns of recent years. And sitting here, on election's eve, SUSA has incumbent Sen. Specter and Toomey tied.

<snip>

Once upon a time I used to think that a Toomey candidacy would be good news for Democratic presumptive nominee Joe Hoeffel. But I've changed my mind. While a Toomey general election victory would be no sure thing, the election would be his to lose. I have seen nothing from Hoeffel to indicate that he can make PA a marquee race this November.

A Specter victory tomorrow, on the other hand, would give us a bloodied and broke candidate who has alienated a significant part of the PA GOP's base. Toomey's ads morphing Specter into Kerry were viciously effective. A good percentage of Toomey supporters (43 percent according to the most recent Q-poll) will not vote for Specter in the general, not surprising if they associate Specter with their top nemesis, Kerry.

So PA Republicans have a choice between a moderately successful centrist Republican incumbent with significant cross-over appeal to Democrats, or a wingnut candidate far to the right of the Pennsylvania general electorate. And I can't believe I'm rooting for the out-of-touch-with-the-electorate wingnut.

http://www.dailykos.com/