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Politics : Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Kerry -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: geode00 who wrote (12570)	4/5/2004 6:23:11 PM
From: John Carragher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 81568

Penn. is mighty for Kerry By HELEN KENNEDY DAILY NEWS WASHINGTON BUREAU Sunday, April 4th, 2004 WASHINGTON - For John Kerry, the road to Pennsylvania Ave. goes straight through Pennsylvania. The aptly named Keystone State is one of a handful that will decide the 2004 election. While President Bush can afford to lose the state, Kerry cannot realistically win without its 21 electoral votes. In the bloody-knuckled battle for Pennsylvania, the Massachusetts senator may have a potent weapon: his wife. Teresa Heinz Kerry was married for decades to Republican Sen. John Heinz of Pittsburgh and inherited his ketchup-and-condiments-empire millions - and much of his popularity - when he was killed in a 1991 plane crash. A longtime and vocal Pittsburgh booster, she has been dubbed "St. Teresa" for her charity work in Pennsylvania. "Teresa is a force," said leading state Republican operative James Baumbach. "Her late husband was pretty revered, even more so after the tragic way he died." While sometimes given to making impolitic comments to reporters, Heinz Kerry proved herself an adept and tireless campaigner in Iowa and New Hampshire. On her home turf, she is liable to sway a decent number of votes. Even a percentage point or two could be decisive in what looks to be another squeaker of an election. Kerry has spent more money on ads in Pennsylvania than in any other state so far, hoping to squeeze out a narrow victory on the order of Al Gore's in 2000. Bush, meanwhile, is determined to block Kerry and has made more campaign stops in Pennsylvania than in any other state. Trying to put a good face on things, Democrats said Bush's visits hurt him because he always talks up the economy in a state that is feeling battered. "The President is our best campaigner," said Pennsylvania Democratic Party head Don Morabito. "We calculate he's losing 100,000 votes each time he comes here. On the issues he chooses to emphasize when he comes here, our reality is very different." Pennsylvania has lost 130,000 jobs under Bush and polls show that the state economy - especially in the all-important Philadelphia suburbs - is the voters' chief concern. "This is an unusually sensitive state to economic indicators, particularly employment," said Terry Madonna, director of the Keystone Poll. "People think the state is moving in a wrong direction, and that's not a good sign for any incumbent." Right now, however, the battle is being fought on the airwaves and the President is winning big. Pennsylvania TV viewers have been barraged by nearly 4,000 ads in just the last three weeks, according to Wisconsin experts who track ad spending. In those three weeks, Bush spent $2.2 million on 2,007 spots in Pennsylvania. The only place he spent more money was Florida. Kerry, who has far less money, spent $235,000 on 484 ads in Pennsylvania, but was bolstered by liberal groups who anted up $1.5 million to air 1,367 anti-Bush ads. The Bush ads painting Kerry as an unprincipled, flip-flopping tax-hiker are working dramatically well. Last month, the Keystone Poll had Kerry and Bush neck and neck at 47% to 46%. This month, Bush remained steady at 46% but Kerry slid seven percentage points to 40%. "The Bush people began to define Kerry in Pennsylvania before he was able to define himself nationally," Madonna said. "But those people went to undecided. Bush was unable to move his own numbers." Most experts predict Kerry's numbers will bounce back by Election Day, keeping the state a critical tossup.