It looks as if Republicans finally got the candidate they wanted to run against Paul Kanjorski in PA-11, the right wing mayor of Hazleton, Lou Barletta. Barletta is known as the guy who as mayor passed all kinds of anti-immigrant measures. He ran for Congress against Kanjorski in 2002 and lost by 14%.
This is a district that John Kerry carried by a healthy 53%-47% margin and Al Gore carried it by an even bigger 54%-43%. The Republican legislature drew the district to be a safe Democratic district in order to make PA-10 and PA-15 more Republican. They did this by removing heavily Republican rural areas and adding in a heavily Democratic slice of Lackawanna county.
I have to say that I am somewhat frustrated that more Democratic held seats seem to be coming into play. If we were to lose seats in 2008 while winning the White House, it would be a big black eye for the new Democratic President elect, likely making it impossible to pass anything. We need to keep this seat and all we need to do to keep it is make sure voters in the district vote straight ticket as this is a district that any Democratic candidate for President will carry.