Next year’s governor’s race in Pennsylvania hasn’t gotten as much attention as the Senate race (Specter vs. Sestak for the right to take on Toomey), but it looks like Pennsylvanians haven’t spent much time thinking about that race, either. However, in Pennsylvania, like a lot of other states these days, it’s better to be a Republican than a Democrat, at least according to Quinnipiac:
Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett has a 38 – 12 percent lead over Jim Gerlach for the Republican nomination for governor and holds double-digit leads over three of the top candidates in the wide-open race for the Democratic nomination, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.
Pennsylvania voters say 59 – 35 percent that allowing marijuana to be used for medical purposes is a good idea, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll finds.
Term-limited Gov. Ed Rendell, who cannot seek a third term, gets a negative 43 – 49 percent job approval rating, a trend that began in July when the state lived through a three-month budget stalemate that turned off voters of both parties.
The State Legislature, with which Gov. Rendell feuded during the budget standoff, gets a much lower 25 – 64 percent negative job approval, its worst score ever.
“Fifty percent of Pennsylvania voters don’t know enough about Attorney General Tom Corbett to form an opinion. For all the other candidates, the ‘don’t know enough’ number ranges from 72 to 88 percent,” said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. “That edge in name recognition is an obvious plus for Corbett. But what is interesting is that the other candidates have not been making much progress, either in trial heats against Corbett, or in greatly improving their name recognition.”
In the five-way race for the Democratic nomination for Governor, Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato leads the field with 14 percent of the vote while none of the others crack double-digits. Most voters, 59 percent, are undecided.
I see the name “Tom Corbett” and think, “He seems like the kind of guy who would leave the light on for me.”