Jim Geraghty points to a new poll on the Democratic primary race for Pennsylvania Senate showing Rep. Joe Sestak tied with Specter. I have been watching Sestak’s improving numbers over the last few months with some interest. Back in 2006, his race against Curt Weldon in a suburban House district in southeastern Pennsylvania was one of the contests I noticed pretty early on, and I thought his victory that fall represented the public’s turn against the Iraq war, which Sestak opposed, and against the GOP majority’s culture of corruption that had come to taint Weldon himself. When Specter switched parties, Sestak launched a seemingly quixotic primary challenge against an incumbent Senator who enjoyed overwhelming Democratic establishment support. As soon as the possibility of his challenge had been raised, I was quite confident that he could defeat Specter in the primary and would be able to go on to win against Toomey. As I wrote almost exactly one year ago:

Not only would Sestak have an advantage in enthusiasm and turnout, neither of which Specter could count on, but he would also head off any third party challenge from the left that might come about if the general election pitted two pro-war candidates in a heavily antiwar state, as it would if Specter were the Democratic nominee. Sestak has impeccable credentials on national security–he is a retired rear admiral who served as part of the operations in Afghanistan–and he opposed the Iraq war. Even though Pennsylvanians are likely to be much more concerned about domestic matters, a stark contrast between an antiwar former military officer and a pro-war political activist does not work to the Republicans’ advantage. A Sestak-Toomey match-up would be a possibly more lopsided replay of the 2006 results. This is why Toomey’s challenge never made much sense, even if Specter had not flipped to the other side, because in a general election that isn’t against Specter I don’t see how Toomey possibly wins*. His chances are considerably worse against a real Democrat.

Obviously, other issues are more important now and probably were more important a year ago than national security and foreign policy issues, but I do think it is important for him that Sestak has both national security credibility and antiwar credentials. This could either completely neutralize any Toomey criticism on national security, or it could put Toomey at a disadvantage and on the defensive. Having served in support of the war in Afghanistan, Sestak has remained consistently supportive of the war there. As a retired officer and veteran, he is also not reckless in his foreign policy views. Of course, he is also a fairly progressive Democrat, but this is another reason why he will prove to be a better fit for the Pennsylvania electorate than Specter or Toomey.