Pat Toomey

Mitt Romney made a bold prediction Friday during his first public campaign stop in months in a state where polls show him lagging and that GOP insiders say he has all but given up. "We're going to take Pennsylvania," he promised an animated crowd at Valley Forge Military Academy and College in Wayne. His assessment earlier in the day at a Union League fund-raiser in Philadelphia was sober, yet optimistic. "We really would shock people if early in the evening on Nov. 6, it looked like Pennsylvania was going to come our way," he told donors before adding that he was confident he could do it. Whether those remarks amounted to mere campaign bluster or signaled a late reassessment of the Republican presidential candidate's chances in the Keystone State remained anyone's guess.

In 2004, even many Republicans thought Pat Toomey was too extreme for the U.S. Senate. Toomey was a little-known, fiscally conservative congressman from Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley taking on moderate Arlen Specter, who was seeking a fifth term. Yet the challenger almost won that Republican primary. Only strong backing from President George W. Bush and Senate colleague Rick Santorum saved Specter. Six years later, Toomey's call for a rematch scared Specter right out of the GOP. And still there were Republicans hoping for someone more "electable," such as moderate Tom Ridge, the former governor and Homeland Security director.

MAYOR NUTTER, burdened with the violence of 20 homicides in Philadelphia's first 15 days of 2012, was due at the podium for yesterday's 30th annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day luncheon. But master of ceremonies E. Steven Collins was asked to add a surprise speaker to the roster. And as hundreds of people ate their lunches and spoke with old friends, the words of President Obama began emanating from the stage. People stopped buttering rolls and looked up. Obama wasn't there.

John F. McNichol, 75, a guiding force of the Delaware County Republican Party for four decades, died Saturday. He had been on the rebound from surgery but fell ill on New Year's Eve while eating dinner with his wife, Joan Fenton McNichol, and friends, and died shortly afterward at Chester County Hospital, said Thomas Judge Sr., a former leader of the county GOP. Mr. McNichol never held elected office, but presidents and senators sought his...

Barack Obama could've done his reelection efforts a world of good if a certain U.S. senator from Pennsylvania had been by his side Wednesday in Scranton. No, I don't mean Democrat Bob Casey. I'm talking about Pat Toomey. An unlikely pairing, I know, but consider: What if the supercommittee hadn't come up empty on a plan to reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion? What if the panel had embraced the pro-growth compromise offered by Toomey, who balanced about $750 billion in spending cuts with roughly $500 billion in new revenue - while still cutting marginal tax rates and avoiding a tax increase?

It can be mildly entertaining or even enlightening to see how our elected officials invest, so we took a look at the excellent Center for Responsive Politics database and researched the portfolios of three Pennsylvanians: Sens. Pat Toomey, a Republican who resides in Lehigh County, and Bob Casey, a Democrat from Scranton, and Rep. Joseph "Mike" Kelly, who represents the Third District, which includes Erie and Sharon in the northwest corner of the state. The three offer both political and geographic diversity, but other than that, this is simply an arbitrary grouping.

Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, a member of Congress' budgetary supercommittee, has always been an orthodox Republican tax-cutter, so it was hailed as a game-changing moment last week when he proposed raising $300 billion in revenue as part of a deal to cut the federal deficit. "I'm staying in Washington over the weekend and am available any time," Toomey said in an interview Friday. "The clock is ticking. " He was apparently still waiting Wednesday, with only days remaining until the Nov. 23 deadline for the supercommittee to recommend at least $1.2 trillion in cuts, and Democrats criticizing Toomey's proposal as raising too little new revenue and locking in lower taxes for the wealthy.

Nine regional members of Congress from Pennsylvania and Delaware have asked the U.S. Energy Information Administration for an analysis of the regional impact of the possible closing of three area refineries. In September, Sunoco and ConocoPhillips announced that refineries in Philadelphia, Marcus Hook, and Trainer would be put up for sale. If no buyers were found, the facilities would most likely close. In a letter to the energy agency, the members asked about the effects that the closures of the three refineries would have, not only on jobs, but also on the "supply, distribution, dependence on imports, prices, and market volatility for refined products.

WASHINGTON - Here is how Philadelphia-area senators voted on major issues last week (House not in session): Senate Obama jobs plan. By a vote of 50-50, the Senate on Thursday failed to reach 60 votes for ending GOP blockage of a bill (S 1723) providing $35 billion to avert state and local layoffs of teachers, police, and firefighters. This effectively killed the bill. The bill's spending consists of $30 billion for teacher employment and $5 billion to protect law enforcement and first-responder jobs.