It's a real race after all
By Colin McNickle
PITTSBURG TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, March 21, 2004
WASHINGTON After a few cold, damp and dreary days here - including a downright miserable St. Patrick's Day in which any true Irishman would find solace - the weather had broken. And the sun shone brightly Thursday morning into the second-floor office of U.S. Rep. Patrick Toomey, just across the street from the Capitol.
Consider it a metaphor for what's happening in the Lehigh Valley Republican's campaign to unseat Sen. Arlen Specter.
Two polls released last week have Mr. Toomey, a staunch conservative and now in his third and self-imposed last House term, significantly closing the gap with Mr. Specter, the entrenched Philadelphia liberal. In just under two months, Toomey has, in one poll of likely Republican voters, apparently whittled an incredible 13 percentage points off Specter's 23-point January lead.
"Apparently," I note because earlier polls that had Toomey polling only in the high teens included Democrats and independents who can't vote in the Pennsylvania primary. Other polls included all registered Republicans, another skewed methodology considering fewer than half of registered voters cast primary ballots.
Nonetheless, 10 points behind (and only 9 out in another poll) with five weeks remaining until the April 27 primary, Toomey - written off by even some conservatives as a nice guy but no match for Specter - is pumped, in that characteristic, sedate Pat Toomey way.
"This is virtually a dead-heat race right now," he told me as we sat at his round conference table in the Cannon Office Building, factoring in another polling factoid - 16 percent of the likely GOP electorate remains undecided. "The big, important thing that (these polls) show is that a clear majority of Pennsylvania Republicans don't want to vote for Arlen Specter; that's a huge problem for an incumbent."
If the majority of the undecideds "break" for the challenger, as historically is the case, Toomey wins. And Toomey says he'll win because Specter is so far outside the mainstream of the Republican Party.
"What's more important about this race is that this is our chance to govern," he says. "This is an extraordinary opportunity that the Republican Party has. The last time we had control of both chambers of Congress and a Republican in the White House for anything more than a brief two-year period was 1932.
"That's a long time to wait for a center-right coalition in American politics," Toomey said. "And it's a big deal. It's a big deal whether we seize this chance and actually advance the cause that we say we believe in - limited government, lower taxes, less government spending, the free-enterprise system, and personal freedom and personal responsibility and traditional values - that set of ideals that brought us together as a party.
"I think it would be just tragic if we squander this chance. If would tragic for public policy because we would lose the opportunity to do so many great things for Pennsylvania and the American people."
But haven't Republicans had that chance and blown it because of a spendthrift GOP-led Congress and a president yet to exercise a spending veto? Toomey doesn't disagree. And he says it's actually part of his primary argument.
"There are some cases in which we need to change the Republicans in office," he offered bluntly.
"Not all Republicans believe in this (aforementioned) set of ideals; Arlen Specter doesn't believe in these things," Toomey said. "Across the board -- whether we're talking economic, business, social, cultural, legal, judicial - he has a liberal philosophy. And so when those of us who do believe in the fundamental principles of the Republican Party try to advance legislation that reflects that, we very frequently find we have a pretty good chance of getting it done in the House ... and the Senate becomes a graveyard of good ideas."
Patrick Toomey is among the first to admit that Republicans deserve a lot of blame for wasteful spending. "But if there's any party who's going to get this under control, it's going to be ours," he said. And a Specter defeat next month "will send a very, very loud, clear message about where the grassroots of voting Republicans want this party to go - back to its roots, back to what we say we believe in."
A little more sunshine of the kind that seems to be kissing the Toomey campaign these days and you'll be able to almost see the grass growing and hear the roots gaining a foothold.
Colin McNickle is the Trib's editorial page editor. Ring him at (412) 320-7836. E-mail him at: cmcnickle@tribweb.com. |
