Arizona’s congressional delegation voted on party lines on the big health-care bill in the House; less noticed was another important vote over the weekend, this one on extending unemployment benefits.

Dan Nowicki in the Republic noticed it:

Three Arizona Republicans on Thursday made up 25 percent of the House opposition to the bill to extend unemployment benefits to jobless Americans.

The House voted 403-12 to pass the legislation, which on Wednesday had won 98-0 Senate approval. Reps. Jeff Flake, Trent Franks and John Shadegg were among the 12 “no” votes.

The measure, signed Friday by President Barack Obama, would extend jobless benefits for 14 weeks across the nation and provide an additional six weeks of benefits on top of that for job-seekers in states where the unemployment rate is 8.5 percent or greater.

Emphasis added. Nowicki notes that the Democratic Party blasted Shadegg immediately after the vote—a sign that the party is targeting him next year.

As PHXated has argued before, how the Democrats view Arizona is going to be the most far-reaching political story in the state for the next three years.

If the economy takes another nose dive or even if it just remains stagnant, the Democrats will of course take a hit. But as Obama’s regular appearances here in the state testify, Arizona is on the party’s radar as a swing state in 2012. Even as a favorite son, McCain got only a bit above 53 percent of the vote last year, and the demographic shifts do not favor Republicans. The state could have eleven or twelve electoral votes after the 2010 census; a swing from red to blue would represent a big 22- or 24-vote swing for the Democrats.

Back to the unemployment vote: Note how by Republican logic, tax cuts help the economy by putting money back into the hands of people, but for some reason extending extending unemployment benefits—i.e., putting money into the hands of people—doesn’t.

A rebounding economy would take an arrow out of the GOP’s quiver; it could also make our local right-wing congresspeople vulnerable for not having helped the recovery along—and in this specific case, delivering a big “Screw you” as well to the people made most vulnerable by the downturn.