2012 Pennsylvania Senate - Smith vs. Casey

10/30/2012 -- The NRSC is spending money here, and the polls continue to show a tightening contest. Casey can't seem to break 50 percent, but Smith's peak has been the 45 percent a Republican gets just for showing up in Pennsylvania in a normal year. Something has to change to really view this race as a tossup.

10/15/2012 -- This race has tightened significantly since the end of September. Smith still has a high hurdle to surmount, but that isn't out of the question.

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Eighty years ago, Pennsylvania had 36 congressional districts. All of them save for one -- the 12th -- elected Republicans. It was one of a handful of states that voted against FDR in 1932, and it toyed with voting against him again in 1940 and 1944.  By 1980, it had shifted toward the Democrats to become a swing state: The western region was heavily unionized and Democratic, the Philadelphia Republican machine had disappeared, and Republican strength was found in the Philly suburbs (including northeast Philly) and the mountainous interior.

Today, the state is different once again. The Philly suburbs have moved toward the Democrats, while Pittsburgh has moved toward the Republicans. The state Republican Party has changed as well: It is a more conservative entity than was once the case.  The state's Democratic Party is also much more liberal than the one that elected socially conservative, fiscally liberal New Deal Democrats like Bob Casey.

Casey's son, Bob Casey Jr., is one of the last of the old school, New Deal Democrats in Congress.  He is a decent fit for the Keystone State, with a voting record that is geared toward the blue-collar workers who have given Democrats difficulty in places like Scranton and greater Pittsburgh in the past few decades.  This rendered him somewhat vulnerable to a primary challenge, but none materialized this cycle.  Republicans are hopeful that CEO Tom Smith can make a competitive race out of it.