Here are some highlight quotes from the endorsement:

In one very telling episode, Murphy spent virtually his entire endorsement interview with our editorial board taking shot after shot at the challenger while answering none of our questions. It was, in a word, a “terrible” performance.

But let’s cut to the chase here. When you get beyond the nasty rhetoric and innuendo, what you have is this: Murphy, a loyal soldier in Barack Obama’s Democratic army who has voted consistently to advance the president and his party’s agenda, versus Fitzpatrick, who believes that agenda is wrong for America and promises to vote to undo a lot of it.

Fitzpatrick can be expected to work on behalf of a different agenda. We feel strongly that that’s what America needs.

Make sure you find the time to research the candidates (the commercials are full of mis-representations on all sides) and vote on November 2nd.

• Philly.com – Murphy, Fitzpatrick face off in Eighth Congressional District debate
• Thomas Jefferson Club – Round Four – Murphy vs. Fitzpatrick
• Intelligencer/Courier Times – Murphy, Fitzpatrick draw rowdy crowd

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The following was posted here on Mike Fitzpatrick’s Facebook page.  This sounds like a private debate, that will be aired on Comcast Network.

===========================================================================================================

Murphy makes up facts, unable to provide plan on economy

PHILADELPHIA, Pa.– In their first face-to-face encounter of the fall campaign, Mike Fitzpatrick trounced incumbent Congressman Patrick Murphy during a taping of Larry Kane’s Voice of Reason earlier today.During the debate, Fitzpatrick pressed Congressman Murphy on  record unemployment that more than doubled during his time in Congress.

Unable to provide any plan for economic recovery and job creation, Murphy feebly claimed that the massive $787 billion stimulus bill he championed last year has helped the economy. Additionally, to hide his record of increasing joblessness and deficit spending, Murphy grossly misstated and made up facts during the thirty-minute debate.

Murphy claimed that during the eight years of the Bush Administration, during two of which Murphy was also a member of Congress,  America lost 8 million jobs.  In fact, according to a Wall Street Journal study published in January of 2009, there was a net gain of 3 million jobs between January 2001 and January 2009.  “Congressman Murphy has never been particularly good at counting jobs,” Fitzpatrick said, “unemployment is high enough, but now Patrick Murphy is trying to make 11 million more jobs disappear.”

Additionally, Murphy claimed that the North American Free Trade Agreement was enacted by a Republican Congress. In reality, NAFTA was enacted in 1993, when Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress.  It was later signed into law by then President Bill Clinton, also a Democrat.  “This is just a further example of how Congressman Murphy is willing to bend the truth to suit his political needs,” Fitzpatrick said, “unfortunately for Congressman Murphy he can’t hide the fact that unemployment is at 9.6% and he has no plan to reduce it.”

The debate is scheduled to air on the Comcast Network station on Sunday, September 12th at 9:30 PM and Wednesday, September 15th at 5:30 PM.

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Tom Lingenfelter will not be running for Congress this fall.

A Commonwealth Court judge presided Thursday in Harrisburg over a challenge of the Bucks County man’s nominating petition and decided that Lingenfelter did not have enough signatures overcome the challenge of four 8^th district constituents.

After eight hours of scrutinizing signatures on the petition, Lingenfelter conceded he did not have the 3,958 valid signatures needed to support his candidacy.

Many of the signatures were discredited individually; the judge also eliminated 769 signatures in one swoop when it was revealed the petition circulators lived outside the district, a violation of election rules.

Looks like a battle between Mike Fitzpatrick and Patrick “Patlosi” Murphy!

You can read more about the debates in this Bucks County Courier Times article.

Here are the scheduled debates:

• Oct 3 @ 1PM – Shir Ami Synagogue, 101 Richboro Newtown Rd, Newtown PA
• Oct 14 @ 8AM – Waterwheel Restaurant 4424 Old Easton Road, Doylestown.
• Oct 21 @ 8AM – hosted by the Lower Bucks Chamber of Commerce, at Bucks County Technical High School.  I’m not positive on the date of this one because the way it was worded in the article.
• Oct 21 @ 11:30 AM – Lower Bucks campus of Bucks County Community College (they mention being able to submit questions to this one)

• The Wall Street Journal has an article on The Obama-Pelosi Lame Duck Strategy.  I hope that Patrick Murphy becomes a “lame duck”, but has some class and does not participate in more complete disregard for the will of his constituents
• The Intelligencer has an article on Murphy: Failed policies cost jobs.  It’s nice to see that Congressman Murphy has finally decided to show up in public.  I’m sure the upcoming election threat from Mike Fitzpatrick has nothing to do with this sudden/abrupt change.

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You can read about the press conference in this Intelligencer Article.

In this Philadelphia Inquirer article, they endorse Mike Fitzpatrick for the GOP nomination  in the 8th district (I announced my support for Fitzpatrick in this blog entry)  and Abington businessman Carson Dee Adcock for the 13th district.  They do not, however, offer any detailed analysis of why they chose these candidates. 

It’s interesting to see that a Gloria Carlineo supporter criticized the endorsement and suggested that Carlineo is the best candidate.  She has limited financial support, but her supporters are great at posting supportive responses to any and all posted articles.  Well done!

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• GOP to contest more seats in 2010 (tech.bl0x.info)
• Pa. GOP picks Burns as nominee for Murtha’s seat (seattletimes.nwsource.com)

The candidates are:

• Gloria Carlineo
• Mike Fitzpatrick
• Ira Hoffman
• James Jones

Remember, primary day is May 18, 2010.  Get out and vote.