Congressional Races- We must extend our focus

PennStatedem

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday January 19, 2005 · 9:00 AM PST

2005/01/19 · 09:00

Over the past two months, there has been much debate over how many House races the Dems should target, what criteria to use, how much support unwinnable races should get, etc. I want to give an example of where and why our current targeting is severely flawed, and why we must look more broadly at the races we give our support to.

I'm going to discuss the 3rd CD of Pennsylvania. It covers Northwestern PA; all of Erie County, and parts of six other counties. It extends from the New York border and Lake Erie to the northern suburbs of Pittsburgh. It has a slight Democratic registration edge, Dem performance of approx 48%, and a combination of urban, suburban and rural voters. The major cities in the district have been hit very hard by free trade; Erie has seen thousands of jobs outsourced, the Shenango Valley's steel industry has been hard hit, Butler has lost multiple large employers, and Meadville, once the nation's tool-and-die capital, has seen the industry suffer greatly at the hands of cheaper foreign competition.
Read More

RSS