Newsweek: Hunting Big Game (PA Santorum/Casey Race)

[RamboLiberal]

Beware - Howard Fineman wrote this, but it does make me feel less than thrilled with Casey.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9023597/site/newsweek/

Cambria County is Pennsylvania deer-hunter territory, and you had better be careful before you criticize an American war or a commander in chief. In these Alleghenies, full of devout descendants of Eastern European millworkers, you carry a rifle into the woods—and serve in the military—as a way of life. That's why Democrat Bob Casey Jr. treaded as carefully as a hunter with a buck in view when he campaigned last week at Ed Cernic's annual picnic on a hillside above Johnstown. Seeking votes in his campaign to oust Rick Santorum, perhaps the Senate's most vulnerable Republican, Casey mentioned Iraq once—and then only to laud "the valor of those young men and women who are dying for us" there. But in an interview with NEWSWEEK, Casey crept closer to his target. Santorum, he said, "was not asking the tough questions of this president. What we need most of all to go forward are facts—and this administration isn't giving them to us and leaders such as Santorum aren't asking for them."

Even in deer-hunter country Iraq is an issue, and it could well be a central one in next year's congressional elections. But the terrain is tricky. Democrats see that the conflict is eroding President Bush's job-approval numbers, but they are wary of being portrayed as proponents of a "cut and run" policy, already one of Karl Rove's pet slogans. Republicans want to demonstrate their independence of judgment on the issue, but need to find a way to do so without seeming to abandon Bush or spark debilitating intraparty feuds.

At least for now, Democratic candidates largely have avoided getting too close to the Cindy Sheehan Show, and few seem interested in joining Sen. Russ Feingold's call, due this week, for a firm timetable for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. Casey opposes the idea. "I think to do that, you risk giving the enemy information they shouldn't have," he said. Democrats are offering themselves as concerned supply officers eager to ensure that soldiers get body armor, medical care for their families—and an Iraqi Army capable of taking over. It's a popular message in Cambria County, which, not surprisingly, has sent an unusually large contingent of reservists and National Guard to Iraq.

Republicans will try to force the Democrats off that safe ground by demanding answers to more fundamental questions. Casey says that he would have voted for the Iraq war resolution "based on the facts at the time and what the president told us" and for the appropriations bills to pay for it. "I don't think we'll know for a while" if the Iraq invasion has made America safer, he said, but he adds that "there is no doubt that people here in Pennsylvania think that we're better off without Saddam Hussein." Santorum claimed rhetorical victory. "He answered the questions the same way I did," he said.

Casey needs to make the Iraq case even in rural areas like Johnstown. See this comment from Murtha.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05233/557583.stm

"Get out; get out of Iraq; that's the overwhelming reaction,'' said Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Johnstown, who supported invading Iraq to get rid of Saddam Hussein but has been sharply critical of the administration's post-invasion performance. "People understand the danger there," said Murtha, a Vietnam veteran. "They see the carnage and they feel they were misled.''

[napi21]

1. They're right about the deer hunters. 45 years ago, my FIL was

a declared Pub because he said them damn libs were gonna take your guns away! He was a blue collar worker, union member, lower middle class income earner, in Pittsburgh Pa. Nothing else mattered to him! He was born in Center County Pa, which is the heart of hunting country in the state. That opinion hasn't changed in all these years.

I have managed, through logical thinking, to change my husband and at least one of our two sons to be liberal supporters. The one son is a bit of a challenge, not because of guns, but because he was in the military for 15 years. As I told him...he was brain washed! He needs to start looking at things like they really are! He's improving!