Keystone and Sunshine State Moderation

Pennsylvania and Florida are usually two swing states in each major election that both parties need to win.

There is a good reason as to why those two states always appear to be swing states in each election. It is because of the voter's moderation. New polling in both of those states proves that.

In Pennsylvania, a new poll was released this past week from Rasmussen, which suggests Democratic Senator Arlen Specter is beating both the Republican challenger and his possible Democratic primary challenger.

The poll shows that Senator Specter leads Club for Growth member Pat Toomey by a decent 11 point margin. Specter in that poll gets 50 percent and Toomey gets 39 percent.

Recently, there has been news of a possible Democratic primary Specter could have to face against Congressman Joe Sestak of the Philadelphia area. However, Specter shouldn't be real worried about him at this point, as polls show him winning by 19 points, 51 percent to 32 percent.

The significance of that is the fact that Senator Specter is seen as a moderate Democrat. Both Congressman Sestak and Toomey are seen as extremists on both the left and the right. In Pennsylvania, extremists hardly ever win, unless you live in parts of the heartland of the state, where the right wing succeeds, or in Philly, where the left wing succeeds. However, most of the state is moderate, which would make a victory for either of those guys unlikely.

The poll went onto say that a Sestak and Toomey race would be neck and neck. Sestak would win, but only 45 percent to 39 percent, a six point margin. However, that poll suggests both of them don't hit 50 percent, which means the race is still up for grabs.

A lot of people would say the reason is because they are both unknown. However, extremism might fit into that category, where you would have a lot of moderates of the state fringe at the mention of both of their names.

In the meantime, another state rejecting extremism on both sides of the spectrum is Florida. In Florida, Republican Governor Charlie Crist had decided to run for the Senate seat in Florida to replace retiring Senator Mel Martinez.

Like Specter in Pennsylvania, Governor Crist is facing a left wing Democrat in Kendrick Meek and a right wing primary challenger in Marco Rubio. As of now, both of them are getting absolutely crushed by Crist's bipartisan likability, according to the poll released by Mason Dixon.

In the Mason Dixon poll, Governor Crist currently leads the Democratic challenger 55 percent to 24 percent, a 31 point stomping.

In the primary, Crist does even better. In the primary poll against Rubio, Crist leads 53 percent to 18 percent, an incredible 35 point smashing. A Quinnipiac Poll shows the lead almost as substantial.

In addition, the Governor receives 60 percent approval ratings across the board from Republicans and Independents, as well as over 50 percent approvals from Democrats. While the extremes of his own party are coming out against him, such as Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina and former Governor Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, the Republicans of Florida are telling those two right now to go to hell.

However, in the case that Crist would lose to Rubio, Meek would win, but it would remain a statistical dead heat again. Meek polls 31 percent in an old poll taken in January, while Rubio gets 22 percent. Again, a lot of people were undecided.

So, what's the comparison here? Both Specter and Crist are moderates of the opposite party. Both are well liked by a majority of the voters. Both are getting hammered by the extreme ideologues in their own parties. Both states are seen as big time swing states in each presidential election. Both states' party voters are telling their extremes to go to hell.

Therefore, it does not make sense for the extremes of each political party to run someone against the more moderate voice in their party that will likely bring them to success in the general election. Doing so could very well be a major catastrophe for their party in both of these states in the coming elections ahead.