Talk:2010 Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district special election

South Dakota comparison

I've reverted a sourced edit comparing this election to the 2004 special election in South Dakota. I think for such a comparison to be valid and not original research there needs to be a reference specifically comparing the two. The comparison also seems to miss the point (made in the now regrettably inaccessible "critznod" ref) that the contested Democratic primaries for Governor and Senate and Pennsylvania will drive up Democratic turnout – as far as I know there was no equivalent phenomenon in South Dakota (though I could certainly be wrong). I'm open to persuasion though, especially if a source comparing the two elections can be found. – Hysteria18 ^{(Talk • Contributions)} 21:11, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Hello Hysteria18, and sorry for the delay in my response. Though I do have to admit that the comparison between the 2004 SD-AL and 2010 PA-12 special elections is not a perfect one, but the point is that claiming that Critz is guaranteed (that may not necessarily the best word, but I think you get what I mean) victory simply because the election is being held concurrently with the primaries is misleading. Republicans held a 10% registration advantage over Democrats in South Dakota, but Stephanie Herseth Sandlin still won that dispite it being held on the same day as the primaries which was to Larry Diedrich's advantage but he still lost (though I could not find any information regarding the U.S. Sentorial primaries on the Secretary of State of South Dakota's website). Another example, which I did not include in this article, albeit also another imperfect comparison, but probably better one than the aforementioned race, is the California's 50th congressional district special election, 2006 in which Brian Bilbray (R) won despite it coinciding with Congressional and state primaries, which included an especially competitive Democratic gubernatorial primary, which helped Francine Busby (D), who ended up losing anyway, and a far less competitive Republican gubernatorial primary. The bottam line is that a House special election coinciding with the priamaries plus competitive U.S. Senate and other state and local primaries for one party does not necessarily yield an ensured victory for that party. I will try to find some information regarding analysis that compares the '10 PA-12 special race with the '04 SD-AL and '06 CA-50 special elections if I can find any.Fuelsaver (talk) 21:44, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

I think it's worth pointing out here that the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. If the comparison to either CA-50 or SD-AL were valid (if there were contested Democratic primaries (and, I guess, relatively uncontested Republican primaries) coinciding with a Republican special election victory), making such a comparison is still original research if no source specifically comparing the two races can be found. Of course, if you're able to find such a source, none of the above applies. – Hysteria18 ^{(Talk • Contributions)} 19:41, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

The Candidates

Someone needs to create pages for Mark Critz and Tim Burns. They both stand a good chance of getting elected to Congress, and I think that's a good qualification. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.218.2.18 (talk) 19:14, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

The notability guideline for politicians says:

Just being an elected local official, or an unelected candidate for political office, does not guarantee notability, although such people can still be notable if they meet the primary notability criterion of "significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject of the article."

So if you feel that Critz and Burns meet the primary notability criterion, please be bold and create articles for them (you'll need to create an account first). – Hysteria18 ^{(Talk • Contributions)} 20:06, 29 March 2010 (UTC)