I went to high school with Bobby Cordaro. And he was all those things and a bag of chips. Class president, football star, and hot as hell – if you liked that type, and I did, and in the late ‘70s, who didn’t? He went off to the University of Rochester (more football, more honors), then to Penn Law. Impressive for a kid from Dunmore. There was a brief dalliance in Los Angeles, at Mayor Richard Riordan’s law firm. Then he came home, as Scranton boys tend to do. Married his high school sweetheart, began his career in politics by getting trounced in a 1988 congressional race as a Democrat against Republican legend Joe McDade. Over the next decade, he kept practicing law, bought five radio stations, had five kids. Then, in the late ‘90s, back in the game. In a tangled race in which he switched back to Republican (for good) and had his running mate get snuffed out for using cocaine, he became the minority commissioner for Lackawanna County to Joseph Corcoran. Then, in 2003, he seized the majority with running mate A.J. Munchak. It was a glittering time.

The last time I saw Bobby, who I still call Bobby, it was at his dazzling Inauguration gala at the Scranton Radisson in 2004. Damn, he still looked good. From a distance, over the years to come, us Scranton expats watched Bobby do some neat things for our hometown. He cleaned up the county courthouse (aesthetically, that is), privatized Montage ski resort, and most important, brought the Yankees farm team to town! He also reformed the county prison, which in the irony of ironies would lead to his downfall, when the FBI discovered that one of Bobby’s cronies was stealing from the workers’ compensation fund. The FBI kept digging, along with the IRS. And in 2011, he was convicted on 18 felony counts, including racketeering, extortion, bribery, money laundering, and tax evasion. Oh, Bobby. Say it wasn’t so.

The last time I saw Bobby, who I still call Bobby, it was at his dazzling Inauguration gala at the Scranton Radisson in 2004. Damn, he still looked good. From a distance, over the years to come, us Scranton expats watched Bobby do some neat things for our hometown. He cleaned up the county courthouse (aesthetically, that is), privatized Montage ski resort, and most important, brought the Yankees farm team to town! He also reformed the county prison, which in the irony of ironies would lead to his downfall, when the FBI discovered that one of Bobby’s cronies was stealing from the workers’ compensation fund. The FBI kept digging, along with the IRS. And in 2011, he was convicted on 18 felony counts, including racketeering, extortion, bribery, money laundering, and tax evasion. Oh, Bobby. Say it wasn’t so.

Former U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb has read more Pennsylvania polling than almost anyone who isn’t paid to, probably because, for nearly a decade, that was a big part of his day job. Lamb won a hard-fought March 2018 special election by 627 votes in my home district that Donald Trump had carried by nearly 20 points, then won the redrawn 17th twice before coming up short in the 2022 Senate primary to John Fetterman. He still remains an active observer interviewing the Democrats running in 2026. We spoke a month out from the midterms, and he explained that Democrats have plenty of reasons to be excited about the state of play. 

The New York Times/Siena/Inquirer poll released Sept. 24 had incumbent Gov. Josh Shapiro beating Stacy Garrity 58% to 38%, with 33% of voters saying they had never heard of the state treasurer. Trump's favorability in the same survey sat at 38% to 61%. Franklin & Marshall put Democratic challengers ahead in the 7th and 10th Districts the same week. Charlie Cook has called this a “red undertow” election: Trump’s numbers drag Republicans down without much affection for Democrats pulling anyone up.