one of my periodic beefs is how pennsylvania is always referred to as a "swing state". it comes up every presidential election year. but the last time that PA gave its electoral votes to a republican was 1988. from the record it seemed like PA was pretty reliably democratic, at least in terms of presidential votes over the past 20 years. PA's blue shift has also been evident in other (non-presidential) elections. in the 11 years since i moved to this state the governorship went from a moderate republican to a democrat, we ditched rick santorum (then one of the more reactionary senators) for a bland bob casey, and our one seemingly senator for life, the so-called moderate arlen specter, jumped ship and became a democrat. if the state swings, it looked to me like the swinging was all in one direction.
at least that's how i saw it until now. there's no presidential vote this year, but the governor's race and the senate race both seem to be solidly stuck in the GOP's column. i wonder if this means that my state really is a swinger, despite my protests to the contrary.
