Primary Concerns

Several primary elections to nominate candidates for public office are being held in several states tomorrow, but the two biggest primaries gaining attention are the Democratic primaries for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania and Arkansas.

In Pennsylvania, Senator Arlen Specter is in a dead heat with Delaware County congressman Joe Sestak for the right to run for Senate against Republican Pat Toomey in November. Specter, who became a Democrat last year, is one of the last two Republican senators elected on Ronald Reagan's coattails in 1980 (Iowa's Charles Grassley is the other) that gave the GOP its first Senate majority since 1954. Now Specter is running with the support of President Obama and Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell to preserve the Democratic majority.

Sestak is claiming that Specter changed parties for political expediency and doesn't share the core values of Pennsylvania Democrats, though Specter has union support and also provide a necessary vote for health care reform. But Specter did vote for Clarence Thomas's confirmation to the Supreme Court in 1991 - about as popular with rank-and-file Democrats as hot cocoa in Ecuador. Though Specter was the most liberal member of the Senate Republican caucus until he switched parties, he was still a Republican, and he supported other judicial nominees from Presidents named Bush. Though Obama has thrown his support to Specter, he has wisely eschewed the opportunity to campaign for him. Which makes sense, considering what a huge asset he was for Martha Coakley in Massachusetts.

Specter is slipping a bit but he can't be counted out, especially when the polls show a huge groups of undecided voters making the election to close to call. Although progressives are excited by and eager to support Sestak, polls show that Specter would have a better chance of defeating Toomey, a Tea Party darling. I'm not endorsing either candidate. If I were a Pennsylvania resident today, and if I were voting in the primary, I'd toss a coin in the voting booth.

In Arkansas, the case is more clear-cut. Incumbent senator Blanche Lambert Lincoln, a conservative Democrat who has taken campaign money from big business and helped kill the government insurance option in the health care bill, has angered Bill Halter, the state's lieutenant governor, Bill Halter, to run against her in the primary and claim (with considerable justification) that she doesn't speak for and vote in favor of ordinary Arkansans. So I endorse Halter. Halter is running behind, and Lincoln has the support of Obama and former President (and former Arkansan) Bill Clinton, both of whom clearly prefer to stick with the devil they know rather than the devil they don't know. But the undecided share of likely voters could also swing tomorrow's result either way, and it promises to make for as spirited a primary there tomorrow as in Pennsylvania.

But how much enthusiasm on the left will translate to victories tomorrow? And would Sestak or Halter, if nominated, be mainstream enough for general election voters in November? That's my worry.