In Pennsylvania, the Democrats have a chance to reach a hand out to the Green Party in a vital Congressional race.  Pennsylvania's 15th Congressional District is one of the nation's most competitive districts.  In 2004 Democrat John Kerry won the 15th district in very close race, as narrowly did Republican Congressional candidate Charlie Dent for an open seat.

This year, as Freshman Dent seeks reelection, the Democrats have failed to produce a single candidate for the congressional race, let alone one viable one.  The Greens, however, are running a local girl, Greta Browne.  Given the failure of the Democrats, this may be the chance for the Green Party to capitalize.

If Pennsylvania's Democratic Party reaches out to the Greens and choose to endorse Browne, the district will have a progressive choice in November, and given the political atmosphere of the day, it may not be as difficult as it once seemed for a third party candidate to triumph and for voters to kick out another Republican.

With the Lehigh Valley cities of Allentown, Easton, and Bethlehem in the district, there is plenty of progressive support, and, as a local, I believe people in this district may be willing to consider a fresh alternative.

By throwing their weight behind Greta Browne, the Democrats and Greens together will be able to put another progressive woman in office.  It would be a real shame for this seat to fall to the republicans without a real contest.

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Part I: The Generic Congressional Ballot

This part of the series focuses on running Democrats in as many seats as possible. Here are the numbers of seats in the House of Representatives contested by each party in most recent congressional elections:

                          1994    1998    2000    2002    2004
Repulicans             419     396     404     399     406
Democrats              401     380     403     391     400
Dem Seats Won      204     211     212     205     202
Dem Vote %          45.5    47.7    47.9    45.9    47.5

Notice that in 1994, Republicans peaked both in terms of the number of seats they challenged, and the margin they held over Democrats in terms of the number of seats challenged. Note also that the best Democratic year in the House in recent memory, both in terms of seats won and percentage of total votes received, was 2000. That was also the year that Democrats peaked both in terms of seats challenged overall and number of seats challenged relative to Republicans. While that certainly is not enough to demonstrate a direct relationship between challenging more seats and winning more seats / votes, it does suggest a possible relationship. Also, one wonders what could have been in 1998, when Democrats actually won more votes per challenged seat than Republicans, 82,287 to 81,236. Would Democrats have won the House if they challenged 420 seats or more in 1998? It certainly seems possible.

Overall, in every cycle for which I have information, Republicans have challenged more seats than Democrats. Also, in every cycle, Republicans have won more votes than Democrats. What is particularly frustrating and perplexing about this is that Democrats have far more "super safe" seats. According to Charlie Cook, there are thirty-one Democratic seats that are safer than the safest Republican seat. Republicans face significantly more quixotic, sacrificial lamb type campaigns than Democrats, and yet Republicans still field more candidates than Democrats. If both parties were equally shying away from difficult campaigns, than Democrats would be running far more candidates than Republicans. Instead, Republicans are regularly fielding more, sometimes far more, candidates than Democrats. Even though Republicans have controlled Congress for over a decade now, Republicans are still fielding more candidates and challenging for more difficult seats than are Democrats. This state of affairs smacks of a disturbingly high level Democratic timidity on a national scope.

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