HARRISBURG — It’s the comparison to eight years ago that nags at some Republicans.

Then-U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum was deemed unworthy of re-election by 47 percent of voters surveyed in an independent poll 14 months before he lost to Bob Casey in a landslide that shook Pennsylvania politics.

Now many Republicans are watching with growing unease as Gov. Tom Corbett’s poll numbers deteriorate. In late August — 14 months before voters decide on their next governor — the same pollster, Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, said 69 percent of registered voters did not believe Corbett deserves a second term.

It’s led some GOP loyalists to question whether it’s time to recruit another candidate to run in 2014.

Pennsylvania’s Republican Party chairman, Rob Gleason, said he knows of no internal dissension over Corbett.

“Our party is united behind Tom Corbett, everybody is going to be working hard for Tom Corbett and Tom Corbett is going to be re-elected,” Gleason said Friday.

John Brabender, a consultant to Corbett’s re-election campaign, said party stalwarts ex-Gov. Tom Ridge, U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey and Santorum are supporting Corbett. Plus, polling numbers for Corbett will not matter until after voters know who his Democratic opponent will be, and Corbett’s campaign begins spending money to sell his candidacy to the public, Brabender said.

And besides, Brabender said, politicians of all stripes are suffering because of the discord in Washington, D.C.

“Right now, there are a lot of generic numbers for candidates everywhere that aren’t what they should be and, quite frankly, that’s reflective of what’s going on in Washington,” Brabender said.

Since Corbett’s first year in office, Republican lawmakers, party officials and political consultants have privately griped he lacked the flair for building relationships or making a persuasive policy argument to the public.

Republicans note that it would be unprecedented in modern Pennsylvania politics for a party to abandon its governor. And strategists say a sitting governor tends to have a fundraising advantage over a challenger — perhaps one reason no Pennsylvania governor has been denied re-election since the state began allowing its chief executive to seek a second term in 1974.