State of Pennsylvania came men who are a masters at the art of pandering.  The seek to use to ways of bullshit-fu to do battle with his enemies on the podium of oral combat to claim victory over the lands known as Pennsylvania Congressional Districts.

Trump Won Pennsylvania. Democrats Want the State (and His Voters) Back.

PA-18 is in the suburbs of Pittsburgh.  Pittsburgh is a steel town.  The whole Western Pennsylvania region is home to several US steel makers.

Say what you want about Trump and his tariffs.  I don’t think that they were the best of ideas, but they have caused a boom in the US steel industry.

*For the record, China was engaged in commodity dumping of steel.  I agree with fighting Chinese commodity dumping.  There are way to combat commodity dumping without tariffs that can cause a backlash in other markets.

So overcoming the Trump success in the heart of the American steel industry is going to be tough.  Especially as Democrats getting national attention are cheering on socialism and other radical ideas.

The rules are workable enough in the right hands, in the right corner of a right-leaning region of a state like this one.

Avoid the jacket-and-tie look, so voters — wary enough of Democrats — do not think they are looking at a Jehovah’s Witness. “That happened,” recalled Representative Conor Lamb, now in a polo shirt.

No, they don’t think you look like a Jehovah’s Witness.  They think you look like one of the Wall Street/DC crew that shows nothing but hate and contempt for Americans who don’t have maids.

Pivot to safe subjects. After a local here loudly mocked the idea of “Russian collusion” with President Trump to a peer, Mr. Lamb, 34, moved in to introduce himself, telling the man (who said he was Russian) about falling in love with Russian cuisine when he was in the Marines.

How about not believing an insane conspiracy theory that America was hoodwinked by Putin not to ordain Hillary Clinton to the position that she felt entitled to?  Not “just don’t talk about it” but “understand what really happened and not what the DNC says happened to avoid doing some honest soul searching.”

And if all else fails — and it will, often — there is always prayer.

“I was reading a little Isaiah this morning,” Mr. Lamb said at a town festival recently, approaching Paul Strano, 69, whose hat read, “F.B.I.: Firm Believer In Jesus.” The two bowed their heads.

This guy is a blaspheming charlatan.  It’s one thing to not address religion if you have good policies.  It’s something much worse and more offensive to fake it to the faithful for the votes.

The challenge is real: Unemployment in the state is below 5 percent, and Mr. Trump’s approval rating, while underwater over all in Pennsylvania, remains high among the Republicans who populate districts like Mr. Lamb’s. But in candidates like him and others across the state, national Democratic officials believe they have found a model, with a curious signature feature: Democrats in no rush to remind certain audiences that they are Democrats.

So they are going to hide the fact that they are elitist snobs who hate working class white people and independent thinking minorities?  They aren’t going to change their views, they are just going to reserve letting the hate pour out of them until they get to the fancy rooms of the DNC offices in DC.

The balance is delicate. Mr. Lamb speaks of labor rights and economic fairness, in the Democratic tradition, but stakes out more conservative ground on social issues like guns.

How?

He begs off questions about national politics, but makes clear that he wants to see Nancy Pelosi replaced as the leader of House Democrats. He observes that “heroin kills both Democrats and Republicans,” the only mention of the D-word on his campaign website’s home page.

Does he plan on doing anything about the southern border where much of the heroin comes in from?

Mr. Cartwright’s Republican opponent in the area is John Chrin, a former investment banker who has pumped more than $1.3 million into his campaign. Mr. Cartwright is seen as the favorite, but he is one of a small number of incumbent House Democrats nationwide whose races are viewed as competitive. A recent ad from Mr. Chrin’s campaign accuses Mr. Cartwright of supporting so-called sanctuary cities and “protecting criminals,” while also voting in lock step with Ms. Pelosi.

But the congressman has strained to avoid such typecasting as a liberal shill. Among other flourishes, he has been eager to share word of a new hobby with prospective voters: deer hunting.

“My job is to get to know people and learn about their passions,” he said in the interview.

There is another upside. “It helps me talk to Republican members of Congress, too,” Mr. Cartwright said. “It’s a nice way to say, ‘You know, I don’t hate you.’”

Let that sink in.  A Democrat Congressman is going to become a Fudd to show the working class people of North East Pennsylvania that he doesn’t hate them.  That is more condescending than if he did nothing at all.

Mad dad used to say “Never trust a Democrat with a shotgun in an orange vest.”  He was right, of course.  The Dems always promise you that they aren’t going to take away your deer rifle or duck gun.  It’s just your AR, handguns, magazines over 10 rounds, and right to carry concealed they want to take away.  Then whey have have that, they’ll take away your “military sniper rifle” because the USMC M24 is built on the same Remington 700 action as the ADL you bag buck with.

But you know what would say “I don’t hate you” better than a photo op with a dead dear?

How about if these schmucks went on MSNBC and CNN and Real Time and all the other shows and said:

“Hillary Clinton was wrong.  These people are not racists and bigots and deplorables.  They are hard working salt-of-the-earth Americans who have lived in these towns, working in the same industries for generations.  They economy has moved on them, and watching a community your family has lived in for a century slowly die around you is frightening and disheartening.  We did a bad job supporting these people and we did a worse job listening to them and understanding their needs.  We need to stop insulting them, belittling them, and condescending to them and instead represent them and fight for them.”

Except that it might be a little hard to come down that from from the ivory tower.

Instead, they are going to pander and lie and bullshit.

The amazing thing to me is that the New York Times published this.  I guess they just assumed no one in those regions of Pennsylvania reads the NYT to see that these Democrats are the same in the inside, they’ve just learned not to look down their nose when they talk to you.