Posts for category ‘PA Governor’

Tom Corbett, the Republican who wants to be our next governor, would be a DISASTER for NEPA in particular.  I’ve pointed out the flaws of this man at every opportunity, but the latest and greatest straight-up threat to NEPA is that Tom Corbett favors VOLUNTARY DRILLING STANDARDS in Marcellus Shale.  It’s bad enough that he doesn’t want to tax drillers.  Now he’s saying they can do whatever kind of safety they feel like.  That’s right, according to Corbett, it’s not the government’s job to make sure drinking water is safe.  According to Corbett, corporations are sweet, kind entities that will do what’s right no matter how much it costs them.

This is either naivety, or he was bought out.  Look at his campaign finance reports and the answer is clear.  Hint: It’s $360,000 that they’ve given him.  Okay, it’s not a hint.  I’m putting it out there.

Do not vote for this Tom Corbett.  NEPA cannot afford it.

Vote Dan Onorato, 2010.  He’s against poisoned water.

Admittedly, the polls rarely look good for Democrats Joe Sestak, running against Pat Toomey for Senate, and Dan Onorato, running against Tom Corbett for Governor.

Today, Toomey is up 9 points in a poll from Franklin and Marshall.  The spread is 40% Toomey to 31% for Sestak.  That’s a likely voter sample.  Among registered voters, Toomey only has a 3 point edge, 31% to 28%.

Dan Onorato is trailing Tom Corbett 11 points, according to the same poll.  Among likely voters, it’s 38% to 27%.  Among registered voters, Corbett only leads by 1%, 29 to 28.

What’s important to note is that neither Corbett nor Toomey have made it about the safe zone of 50%.  In fact, they are far from it.  Being in the neighborhood of 10% behind at this point in the game is not insurmountable for Sestak or Onorato.  The registered voter samples in both polls show a very tight race.  This is important because Pennsylvania has a humungous Democratic voter registration advantage at about 1.2 million.  If Onorato and Sestak can get Democrats to show up, then they can win.

While everybody crows about massive Republican victories, it’s important to note that the Republican Party’s favorability is near an all-time low, which is very different than 1994, when they had their pathetically named “Republican Revolution” and took back Congress.  As Joe Biden said, Republicans need to offer an alternative.  They haven’t.  My guess is they can’t.

Onorato and Sestak in 2010!

An e-mail from the Onorato campaign, pointing out yet more flaws in Tom Corbett.  This time his “Say One Thing Do Another” attitude.  Corbett has a history of raising taxes.  Nice.  All of a sudden he’s against them.

Lots of people make promises to get elected — but a candidate’s record really speaks volumes.

Tom Corbett has only helped enact one budget in his career, as a Shaler Township Commissioner. He used that opportunity to cast the deciding vote on a 20% property tax hike.

And now Tom Corbett wants voters to believe that he won’t raise taxes if elected Governor?

Even Corbett’s Republican allies don’t think he can honor his budget promises.

Actions speak louder than words. How can voters trust Tom Corbett’s word when his only experience with taxes is raising them?

Click here to watch a video on Corbett’s tax increase and empty promise, then share the video with your friends.

I don’t have to rely on empty promises to show Pennsylvanians what I’ll do as Governor. As Allegheny County Executive, I have balanced the budget six times in a row without ever raising property taxes. I have the experience to make the state live within its means, reform Harrisburg and get our economy back on track.

Tom Corbett’s record speaks for itself, and it is time he hears that Pennsylvanians know his real record on taxes.

Tell your friends that Tom Corbett’s words are cheap: his history of raising taxes means more than any pledge he can make.

This election isn’t about promises, it’s about experience. And Tom Corbett’s track record with budgets only shows a property tax hike.

Join us and share our video with your friends so they know Tom Corbett’s actions speak louder than his words, and we know his experience with taxes.

Thanks for your help,

Dan

Democratic Candidate for Governor, Dan Onorato, is in the region today for the Tomato Festival.

I’ve written quite a bit about why I’m a fan of him, so allow me to invite you to an Onorato event going on Tomorrow, Sunday, at 1 PM at Joyce’s in Minooka.  We’ll be going door to door in the area on behalf of the candidate.  Anybody interested in attending, drop me an e-mail (tomborthwick@nepartisan.com) or just show up!  We need help.

Why?  Aside from the numerous foibles of Tom Corbett, he is leveraging his position as Attorney General to march in the front of the Tomato Festival Parade.  This should not be allowed unless Dan Onorato, his competitor, is allowed to as well.  Corbett has never marched in a Tomato Parade before, or probably really ever cared about Pittston.

This is probably why Onorato challenged Corbett to a tomato fight yesterday on Radio Corbett’s show.  Onorato also reiterated that he wants to debate Corbett.  In the Democratic primary, he participated in 22 forums.  There have been ZERO face-to-face interchanges between Corbett and Onorato.  This needs to change.  Corbett should accept as many debate offers as Onorato puts on the table, instead of ducking them.  As Onorato said yesterday, “People deserve to hear from the candidates.”  Debates are great formats to see what candidates are made of.  Unless Corbett doesn’t want people to know what he’s made of, which might be gooey and fiscally irresponsible.  Gross.

In any case, hopefully I’ll see you at Joyces’s at 1 PM tomorrow!

Tom Corbett spent a nice chunk of change on a gas-guzzling campaign bus.  Good for him. It’ll take him to voters around the state and allow him to hear their concerns and spread his message.

But it’ll be as filtered as possible.

No press is allowed on the bus, which is not how these things usually go.  So, Corbett is limiting press access.  Why?  I’m sure it’s because when he has a chance to open his mouth where recording devices are, he says things like Pennsylvanians love being unemployed.  His campaign staffers probably said it’s better to keep him away from people with pencils or tape recorders.

If his views were made public, then maybe he wouldn’t win.  Can’t have that.

No press!

Dan Onorato was endorsed by my union, the PSEA, because he is a pro-education candidate.  Beyond the education front, Onorato is absolutely solid and a much better package than Tom Corbett, who has suffered from foot-in-mouth disease.

Yesterday, Onorato took to the stage with Anthony Williams, who ran for governor as a school choice Democrat from Philadelphia financed by four super-rich hedge fund managers.  While on stage, Onorato talked up school choice.  Obviously, this doesn’t sit well with me.  I love Onorato.  I hate school choice (I’ve written about this enough times that I won’t rehash why this is a disaster).

I decided to give Onorato a brief benefit of the doubt, took some deep breaths, thought it through, called some union contacts and campaign people.

While Onorato’s school choice feelings don’t sound like him, he still plans to fund our public schools equitably, he still plans to work for better teacher preparation programs, he still favors fixing our pension system.  Most importantly, and what makes him unique, is that he still supports teachers having a voice in the education process.  Believe it or not, we tend not to.  Policy that we follow is dictated to us by legislators and politicians, most often (think Race to the Top).

Anthony Williams plays a big part in this.  He’s sitting on $5 million after his gubernatorial loss.  Onorato needs to come out very strong in Philadelphia to win this race.  Having Williams on his side, in terms of votes and cash, makes a lot of sense.  I hate to be cynical, but that is politics.  In the end, Onorato is a far better candidate than Corbett, school choice or not.

In my absence, Tom Corbett, rather than cleaning up his image by running a decent campaign for governor, has decided to intensify his suspect campaign by being intensely suspect.  I expected as much, but the series of infractions here is a lot longer than even cynical anti-Corbett me would’ve ever thought.

First on the list: At the Bradford County Fair in Troy, the Attorney General’s office had a table.  At that table, Tom Corbett had campaign literature.  Corbett is often accused (with quite a bit of evidence) that he uses his office as a wing of his campaign for governor.  Obviously, his lawsuit against health care gets him front page status.  Last I checked, helping the poor and sick get medical care is something Jesus would do.  Not Tom Corbett.  His constant pursuit of Democratic foibles and his total willful ignorance of Republican foibles in the General Assembly also reeks of politics.  If logic wasn’t enough for you, now we have photographic evidence that he’s using his office to promote himself.

Next on the List: Tom Corbett has denied a Right-to-Know request regarding collusion between Republican AGs and GOP strategists on Health Care Reform.  If there are documents proving this, then that means Corbett worked with Republican Party political operatives to use Pennsylvania tax dollars and resources to pursue a political agenda.  RTK requests are a basic aspect of democracy: government provides us with information on what they are doing.  I personally like to know things.  Corbett, without any reason, denied the request by Keystone Progress.  If there is nothing to hide, why hide?  I’m sure there’s something incriminating, because the reason we know this happened was because of a RTK request in Wisconsin that involved Corbett.  Funny how we have to find out from another state that our AG is playing these games.

Third: Corbett is the Attorney General and campaigning for Governor simultaneously.  Both are time-consuming.  This is likely why he’s using his office to campaign.  An easy way to fix this problem is to resign as AG and campaign full-time officially.  He won’t.  He doesn’t want Rendell to appoint a successor and, presumably, doesn’t want to give up the perks of a headline-grabbing job.

Fourth: Bill DeWeese, a Democrat charged in Bonusgate, is so confident that he’ll come out looking alright, he wants his trial to happen before the election so that it’ll be publicly proven that Tom Corbett selectively tried Democrats with little evidence.  Good for DeWeese.

Fifth, and most importantly: Tom Corbett, rather than saying he made a mistake by blaming the unemployed for being unemployed, went further and said that there are definitely plenty of jobs!  Just look in a newspaper!  Wow.  If only it were so simple.  I know lots of people who scan the newspapers every single day and have been out of work for months.

If Corbett were governor, how would he govern?  Obviously not from reality.

According to the pollster Rasumussen, which has a Republican-leaning House effect (fancy statistician talk for their polls are skewed Republican), Tom Corbett is up ten points over Dan Onorato.  This isn’t a bad sign at all.  Get rid of the house effect and the lead shrinks.

Further, even if ten were a legitimate number, that is still surmountable, particularly since Onorato is getting great play over Corbett’s total ignorance of the job situation in Pennsylvania.

To remind those who may have forgotten, Tom Corbett thinks people who are unemployed love it and don’t want to work because losing one’s job is awesome.

This has yet to be factored into any polls.  When it does, I’m sure we’ll see a change.

A graph for Tom Corbett, illustrating that he is too oblivious of reality to govern this state:

Oops!  There aren’t jobs and unemployed people aren’t loving being unemployed!  Who would’ve thought?

Not Tom Corbett.

Democrats continue to hit Tom Corbett for saying that the unemployed just plain love being unemployed.  From Onorato, “This is a fundamental difference between me and my opponent, and I don’t know what world Tom Corbett is living in. Tom Corbett doesn’t even recognize there’s a problem, so it’s no surprise that he has no real plan to improve our economy or actually create the jobs that in his mind already exist.”  Oh, snap!  You go, Onorato!

PA2010 called it a “gaffe,” which I think isn’t accurate.  A gaffe is what Joe Biden does every time he opens his mouth.  A gaffe tends to be unintentional.  Corbett’s perspective on the unemployed is informed by his ignorance and lack of caring.  He refused to acknowledge that the unemployed of PA don’t, in fact, think it’s a barrel of laughs!  I’m surprised he didn’t resurrect that old “funemployment” meme that pops up when people want to blame the unfortunate for their own problems.

In response to this, Corbett went ahead and said, “People are perceiving it as insensitive.”  Boohoo!  People didn’t understand what I was trying to say, I’m trying to be positive!  There are jobs out there!  You have to pick yourself up by your own bootstraps and get working!  Even if you can’t afford bootstraps!

I love how it’s everybody else’s fault, not his, that he’s a tactless jerk.

The sad thing is that this statement comes on the heels of a new Quinnipiac poll that puts Tom Corbett up 7 points against Onorato.  Maybe they didn’t call unemployed people in this survey.  After all, their phones were probably shut off when Republicans and conservative Democrats in the Senate refused to extend unemployment benefits.

The poll went 44 Corbett to 37 Onorato, which actually isn’t bad.  Single digits in July means striking range and a good shot at November.  All Corbett needs to do is keep kicking Pennsylvanians when they’re down and all Onorato needs to do is point it out.  Well, and run a decent campaign.  In the Democratic primary, Onorato surged and won because he closed the name recognition gap with a barrage of statewide commercials.  Right now, Corbett has much better name recognition.  If Onorato pulls a similar strategy, a huge ad barrage later in the game, he’ll probably surge late again.  Corbett has been spending his money all summer, while Onorato, who has less, has been conserving it.

In addition, Dan Onorato has attracted the notice of heavy-hitters.  Notably, Bill Clinton may campaign for him.  This could very well mean that the national Democratic party is taking notice and thinks Onorato has a chance.  That will mean money and possible star power.  But Bill Clinton didn’t help Doherty win the State Senate race, so who knows what’ll happen for Onorato?

What’s most important to note is that a 7 point gap with 18% undecided is great news for Onorato.  Most undecides will break Dem, given the statewide registration advantage.

My original title was far more uncouth.  Tom Corbett infuriated the hell out of me.

People don’t enjoy being unemployed, to my knowledge, anyway.  Most people want to make a living.  They don’t want to be afraid of getting sick because they can’t afford to.  They don’t want to have to worry if they’ll make the rent next month.  Despite this (which I would’ve found obvious), Tom Corbett basically came out and said that unemployed people are lazy scumbags, and too bad for them.

This is his quote, which leads me to ask whether he’s an idiot or a jerk: “The jobs are there. But if we keep extending unemployment, people are just going to sit there.”

Rage.

Okay.

Ready?

THE JOBS ARE NOT OUT THERE.

There, I said it.

This man has demonstrated a level of ignorance that displays that he has no concept whatsoever of the toll the recession has taken on the economy and on families.  People don’t prance around when they lose their jobs.

Dan Onorato very rightfully took the opportunity to slam Corbett: “I don’t know what world Tom Corbett is living in. Our economy is struggling, families in Pennsylvania are hurting, and Harrisburg insiders like Tom Corbett aren’t doing anything to help them.”

The state president of the AFL-CIO said,”We are asking Tom Corbett to tell us where are the jobs.”

Good question.  But I doubt Corbett has an answer, since he either lives in an underground bunker with Darth Cheney or he simply has nothing but disdain for the families that are suffering in this economy.

So, maybe I should change the title to Ersatz or Ignorant Ersatz? What do you think?

Bonusgater Mike Veon got 6-14 years for his role in the corruption.  Good.  Individuals who abuse the public trust deserve worse, frankly.  Which brings me to Tom Corbett, who secured this conviction.  Republicans were doing the same thing as Veon, but Corbett did something interesting.  Two years before he opened a formal investigation into State Republicans, he told them that he would be opening an investigation into their activities.  That gave State Republicans two full years to destroy evidence, which they did.  In fact, they replaced their computers and their hard drives (with all that juicy evidence) disappeared.  Nice.  I’m sure they thanked Corbett for the heads up.

Are you all amazed at how I can turn just about anything that could be construed of as positive for Corbett into a negative?  He makes it easy.

Here’s an ad I would love to see from Dan Onorato:  Tom Corbett is trying to take away your health care, and he’s using your money to do it.

That would sufficiently explain the total abuse of Tom Corbett’s abuse of the office of the Attorney General.  Using his offices appropriations to join other Republican AGs in an attempt to repeal health care means he is diverting resources from investigating crime.  Providing health care for those who don’t have it is not a crime.  Trying to deny health care to those who need it certainly is.

Not enough people are paying attention to Corbett’s willingness to undermine progress on the health care front.  This is a mistake for Onorato, as it’s his job to make sure people pay attention.  Most people support the health care bill and, except for Snookie and her tanning bed tax issue, most people haven’t seen any increase in taxes or any penalties in their care.  In fact, it isn’t the end of the world, as Republicans predicted it would be.  One of them called it Obama’s Waterloo.  Ha!

Four AGs participating in this suit lost or are losing their primaries.  In South Carolina, Henry McMaster came in third.  Florida’s AG, Bill McCollum, is trailing his opponent.  Mike Cox in Michigan is polling at third in his attempt to become governor.  Troy King in Alabama lost.  Pattern?  Yes.  Pattern.

Tom Corbett’s willingness to use his office to punish critics, to push a national Republican agenda, to waste taxpayer dollars in partisan crusades, and to take away the health care of young people and the poor demonstrates his total unworthiness to be Governor of this state.

Head over to www.whatstomhiding.com to find another site criticizing Tom Corbett’s inability to handle criticism. He’s still stonewalling Keystone Progress’s Right-to-Know request. I’m sure that’s because Corbett doesn’t want people to know various seedy bits of nastiness that stain his visage (see the Google ads that put him on this site).

The information in question involves discussions between Corbett and national Republicans coordinating a suit against the recently enacted health care legislation. See, Corbett announced he would challenge the law even before it passed. That seems odd, doesn’t it? Then he jumped into a law suit with other Republican AGs. Keystone Progress thinks there was some collusion. Corbett won’t accede to the RTK request, so we can’t clear it up.

We can only guess.

Guess what I guess?

The Republican State Leadership Conference is a party organization, which got caught e-mailing the AG of Wisconsin. It came to light that Corbett was involved. It looks pretty bad. From Keystone Progress:

Emails released by the Wisconsin Attorney General revealed that Corbett’s office received emails from RSLC, which was organizing the lawsuit. The RTK request is seeking those and similar correspondence. RSLC describes itself as “the only national organization whose mission is electing Republicans to the office of Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of State and State Legislator.”1 RSLC is organized as a 527 organization which has contributed over $58 million to elect Republicans at the state level.

RSLC was Corbett’s largest contributor during his race for reelection as attorney general, giving him $691,000, according to the PA Department of State.2

According to Rasmussen, Tom Corbett is up big, 16 points to be exact.  Corbett leads Onorato 49 to 33 with 13 percent undecided and 5 percent voting for another candidate.  That last is the weirdest, as third party candidates don’t get that much.  I would like to know Rasmussen’s methodology, weighting, and the questions they asked, but Rasmussen doesn’t release that information, which means they can’t be independently evaluated for bias.

Statisticians, including Nate Silver over at 538, have pointed out that Rasmussen has a huge Republican house effect, meaning that their polls skew in favor of Republicans consistently.  In addition, they had Rand Paul over Jack Conway in Kentucky by about 26 points after Paul made those absurd statements about how businesses should be able to tell black people to get out.

Rasmussen also engages in “muddying the waters” by which I mean they release so many polls that aggregates are, again, affected by their skewed numbers.

As of last week, Corbett was up by 6 points.  The polling outfit was not Rasmussen.  I don’t see a 10 point drop when Corbett was in the news over his subpoenaing of critics (even Republican blogs were critical of that move).  On top of that, there have been statewide protests calling for Corbett’s resignation over conflict-of-interest issues (the least of which is using his office to go after critics).

In any case, I’m sure Onorato will be doing just fine as time goes on.  He’ll have time to catch up from his 6 point deficit.  Corbett will have time to continue his Orwellian crusade.

PA Attorney General and Trainwreck Governor candidate Tom Corbett has used the power of his office, once again, to stonewall efforts to learn more about him and/or criticize him. This time, he has denied Keystone Progress its Right-To-Know request pertaining to documents related to Corbett’s Health Insurance lawsuit. Not only that, when Michael Morrill, the head of Keystone Progress, went to the AG’s office to hand deliver a new request, he was told that he couldn’t drop it off!

The excuse was that everybody was out to lunch, however, he arrived at 1:15 and stayed until 1:45. If that’s the case, then too many workers appear to be taking too long a lunch, particularly late. I know I’m famished by noon. Maybe Morrill should submit another RTK request.

Once again, Tom Corbett has proven that he is unfit not only for the governor’s mansion, but also his current post as Attorney General. Power has gotten to his head and his desire to stonewall any attempts at criticism or investigation show that he belongs in George Bush’s entourage, not in Pennsylvania politics.

Here are the respective press releases from Keystone Progress:

Corbett’s Office refuses to accept Right to Know Request from Keystone Progress

(HARRISBURG, PA)-Keystone Progress attempted to deliver a Right to Know Request to the Office of Attorney General, but after a 40 minute wait at 1:30 in the afternoon, was told “Everyone is at lunch. Mail it in.”
“Once again, Tom Corbett’s Office is showing its disdain for the public and for the rule of law,” said Michael Morrill, executive director of Keystone Progress. “The Office of Attorney General cannot arbitrarily refuse to accept the legitimate requests of Pennsylvania citizens because its entire staff is at lunch at 1:30 in the afternoon.”

Here is the chronology of the OAG’s refusal to accept a Right to Know Request, by Michael Morrill, executive director of Keystone Progress.

1:15 PM I arrived at Office of Attorney General’s reception area on the first floor of Strawberry Square in Harrisburg. I was asked to call upstairs to the OAG’s office on the 15th floor to get permission to go upstairs. I told the woman who answered the phone who I was and that I wanted to come upstairs to submit a Right to Know request. At first, she said I could come right up. I asked her to talk to Capitol Police officer on duty to let him know it was alright. When the officer got off the phone, he told me that she could not allow me to come up and that I should wait a few minutes until she got an answer. She told him that she would call back in a few minutes.

1:25 PM The officer on duty apologized for the delay and called the OAG asking whether they would allow me upstairs. He was told “everyone was at lunch.” The person on the phone said they would not allow me upstairs, but I could wait.

1:44 PM The first floor receptionist was called by OAG. They said again that everyone was at lunch and that I would have to mail in my request

(The following is the original news release that we filed in anticipation of being able to submit our request.)
Keystone Progress re-files Right to Know Request concerning Corbett’s suit to overturn healthcare reform
First request was denied. Keystone Progress seeking more specific information after Corbett’s office tried to hide correspondence with his major political funder.

(HARRISBURG)-Keystone Progress (KP) has filed a detailed and specific Right to Know Request with Tom Corbett’s Office of Attorney General, seeking information on correspondence concerning Corbett’s politically motivated suit to overturn the federal healthcare reform legislation.

The request seeks all correspondence concerning that suit between the OAG and numerous political operatives and organizations. This is KP’s second request for this information. The first was turned down by Corbett’s office.

Keystone Progress recently uncovered emails that revealed Corbett’s office has been working with a Republican campaign organization to plan to overturn the recently enacted federal healthcare reform law. KP uncovered the relationship in a series of emails released by the State of Wisconsin Department of Justice under a similar request by One Wisconsin Now.

Fourteen state attorneys general have filed suit to overturn the Affordable Healthcare for America Act, the federal healthcare reform law. Corbett has repeatedly denied that his efforts are political, despite the fact that he agreed to join the suit even before he had read the healthcare reform law. The lawsuit was filed just seven minutes after President Obama signed the bill into law.

The staff of the attorneys general have been working with the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC). RSLC describes itself as “the only national organization whose mission is electing Republicans to the office of Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of State and State Legislator.”1 RSLC is organized as a 527 organization which has contributed over $58 million to elect Republicans at the state level. RSLC was Corbett’s largest contributor during his race for reelection as attorney general, giving him $691,000, according to the PA Department of State.2

MORE

“At the risk of getting subpoenaed or being subjected to retaliation by Attorney General Corbett, we are filing another request for this correspondence,” said Michael Morrill, Keystone Progress’ executive director. “The Wisconsin emails reveal what we believe is the tip of the iceberg concerning the involvement of the OAG and political operatives in this suit. Corbett’s office should comply with this request as the AG’s office in Wisconsin did.”

The request seeks all correspondence between OAG and the following:

* Republican State Leadership Committee
* Republican Attorneys General Association
* Republican Party of Pennsylvania
* Republican National Committee
* American Justice Partnership
* Caleb Consulting
* Tom Corbett for Governor
* Tim Barnes, Chairman, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Scott Ward, President, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Ben Cannatti, Political Director, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Erin Berry, Associate General Counsel, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Casey Phillips, Regional Political Director, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Michael Luethy, Regional Political Director, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Adam Temple, Press Secretary, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Robert Sechrist, Director of New Media, Republican State Leadership Committee
* Michael Steele, Chairman, Republican National Committee
* Karl Rove
* Chirag Shah, Campaign Manager for JB Van Hollen WI Attorney General
* Rob Gleason, Chairman of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania
* Joyce Haas, Vice-Chair of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania
* Christine J. Toretti, Republican National Committeewoman
* Robert Asher, Republican National Committeeman
1 Republican State Leadership Committee website http://www.rslc.com/about-rslc/
2Pennsylvania Department of State http://www.campaignfinance.sta…

The furor over AG/Gov candidate Tom Corbett’s ill-informed decision to subpoena Twitter for information relating to the identy of a blogger continues to grow. The New York Times, Keith Olberman, USA Today, and many other news outlets have picked up on this. Basically, Corbett gets criticized over at CasablancaPA and he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t know who runs the site. So, he is using his power as the AG to subpoena them due to some ambiguous and unstated criminal conduct that he says they engaged in.

Blogging is not criminal conduct. Abusing power and quashing the First Amendment because you don’t agree with somebody should be criminal conduct, especially given that this is the top prosecutor in the state. He is also the top hypocrite. Hopefully, this story plays out for a long, long time. Onorato will walk into the Governor’s office if Corbett doesn’t wise up. Which he won’t, since he seems to care little for law (and barely understand it, for that matter).

I saw on PA2010 that Attorney General/Governor Candidate/Health Insurance Industry Bedfellow Tom Corbett has subpoenaed Twitter for information pertaining to a blog critical of him, CasablancaPA.

See, Republicans and totalitarians have a lot in common. They don’t like dissent. So, Corbett is using his power to go all Big Brother on a blog that doesn’t like him all that much. And you know what, it’s not even that they don’t like him, it’s more that they criticize him for being a phony and a hack, which evidence shows he is (look at the Health Insurance contributions and his lawsuit to repeal health care reform).

Corbett does not deserve to win this election. We do not need to elect somebody who uses and abuses their power to go after their critics. Very undemocratic.

In a potential November matchup between Insurance Company Shill, Tom Corbett, and Democrat Dan Onorato, the race has tightened. Corbett leads him 43-37, only 6 points. Corbett previously held a double digit lead, but Onorato’s commercials have likely helped him bigtime.

Sadly, none of the other Democratic candidates match up quite as well. I expect this to keep tightening and I’m hoping that if Onorato wins (I’m still a Hoeffel support, by the way), then Democrats will have a decent shot of winning the governorship.

Dan Onorato, Democratic Gubernatorial candidates, who I had thought was pro-choice, may not be.
I don’t want our state restricting a woman’s right to choose. On top of that, I find it very ironic that the impetus for abortion control often originates with men, despite it affecting, you know, women.
Take a look at this Joe Hoeffel release that points out some of Onorato’s positional oddities:

Democratic candidate for Pennsylvania governor, Dan Onorato, was endorsed by Life-PAC just a few years ago in his run for Allegheny County Executive.

The York Dispatch confirms Onorato’s pro-life position in an article today announcing the invitees to an Americans for Christian Traditions In Our Nation “Values Voter Gubernatorial Breakfast” this Saturday morning, to which only pro-life candidates for governor are invited.

Americans for Christian Traditions In Our Nation (ACTION), is bi-partisan and endorses candidates who are anti-abortion.

ACTION has only invited to its York County breakfast Democratic candidates for governor, Allegeny County Executive Dan Onorato and Auditor General Jack Wagner, and Republicans Attorney General Tom Corbett and State Rep. Sam Rohrer.

“I wasn’t invited,” said Democrat Joe Hoeffel, candidate for Pennsylvania Governor, because I am 100% pro-choice and believe that women can make the best decisions for themselves and their families. That Dan Onorato was invited and is actually sending a representative of his campaign to this breakfast, confirms that he’s pro-life”
In the York Dispatch article, Ron Cohen – the president of Americans for Christian Traditions in Our Nation (ACTION) – said, “Hoeffel and Williams were not invited to the event because they are not anti-abortion.”

Shortly after this release came out, Onorato pulled out of the event. At least he listens to criticism.