I think the title of this post about sums up the entire debate. Both Pennachio and Sandals showed up Bob Casey. I have a lot of things to say about the debate but I will save this post for my initial reactions.

1. Chuck Pennachio won the crowd
2. Alan Sandals won the policy debate, and apparently came across the best on TV
3. Bob Casey spent ALL night avoiding talking about ANY issue. I believe he took two firm stands on anything (1. No SS “Privitization” 2. Vote for increased taxes).
4. The crowd was weak. I was really disappointed in the crowd, the auditorium was not that big and they only filled probably a little over 2/3rds of it. If the Casey folks can’t fill an auditorium that big then they have bigger campaign problems than a lousy candidate. Heck, I, running for State Rep, could’ve filled a room that big if I needed to.
5. The Santorum Campaign is lightyears above the Casey folks. The Casey operation was disorganized, lacked any real energy in the hall. Their handling of the candidate after the debate was sub-par too. On the whole, its clear the Casey campaign ain’t ready for the bigs yet.
6. Focus Groups. Casey reeked of focus groups… every phrase that came out of the mouth of Bob Casey seemed to just be finely crafted gobbedly-gook. The term “independent senator” had to be used a million times. I guess that phrase must set their polls off the charts, but its that type of focus group campaigning that Santorum has gotten so good at beating.
7. Pennachio/Sandals Don’t Have a Prayer. Not that this is much of a revelation but I was sorely dissapointed by the campaign ops of both these men. I know they are low on the funds thing, but STILL… good event operations is 101. Neither had sign waving supporters outside, in fact the ONLY campaign with sign waving supporters outside was RICKS!!!!! They are playing minor league ball, not even tripple-A, we’re talking like Single-A or Rookie League. Pennachio had pamphlets printed on paper, Sandals seemed to have no supporters in the place, and neither had the even operations (t-shirts, sign waves, press packets, gimicks, etc) that any real US Senate campaign would have.

So in short, the winner of tonights debate was Rick. Casey got beat up, his campaign operation was floudering, and they gave Rick a million talking points. If I get a chance tommorow I will post my full point-by-point run down of the content of the debate.

Cross-posted at SantorumBlog

The ratings from the American Conservatives Union are in for 2005. For those who may not be familiar, the Congressmen and Senators are ranked on a scale from 0 to 100, 100 being fully conservative and 0 being a flat out Commie pinko. The results were not surprising to me at all, really, but they just reiterate the work that needs to be done in cleaning up the GOP.

The lowest scoring Republican was……prepare youself, now…….. are you ready…… none other than good ole Lincoln Chafee, Senator from Rhode Island. Lincoln brought up the rear with a whopping score of 12! That’s right, 12. To put this in perspective, 21 Democrats either scored equal to or higher than Chafee. Among those Democrats were Barbara Boxer, Russ Feingold, and Hillary Clinton. I wonder if Libby Dole has this data and if she did would it even matter?

The second lowest that I could see was Connecticut Congressman, Chris Shays, with a score of 20. Not really a surprise. Mr. Shays is always good for revving up the base.

The other usual suspects followed in suit, of course. Delaware Congressman, Mike Castle, had a score of 28. The Sisters Grimm from Maine both came in with a 32. Senator Mike DeWine of Ohio had a 56. Norm Coleman scored a 64. A big let down to me, though again no real surprise, was the score of Pennsylvania Congressman, Mike Fitzpatrick. The Young Conservatives of Pennsylvania pushed for him to take that seat of retired RINO Congressman Greenwood in 2004 thinking he would be an improvement to advancing the true principles of the GOP. His leftward leanings quickly became clear after he took the seat and sadly he finished 2005 with a score of 60.

Probably the most disappointing to me was the New Hampshire delegation. After going for John Kerry and electing a Democratic governor in 2004, I am beginning to wonder if “Live Free or Die” has lost it’s luster, especially after I saw the following results: Sununu - 83, Gregg - 72, Bradley - 60, and Bass - 58. Sununu is okay, Gregg needs to work on a few things, and Bradley and Bass need to be tarred and feathered and run out of the state. Where are their primary challengers at?

Interesting notes from the Democratic side. The head of the class as always was Nebraska’s Ben Nelson with a score of 60. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana scored a 44. Stephanie Herseth of South Dakota, though she is slipping, still holds a lifetime rating of 49. The Soviet Socialist Republic of Massachusetts was beyond pathetic. 9 out of the 13 members of their delegation received a big fat ZERO. Oh, and to all the Republicans out there who seem to think that Joe Lieberman is our buddy just because he stands behind Bush on the war. He got a whopping 8.