More musing on PA-12 candidates (Updated)

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

More here on the possible Democratic field for Jack Murtha's district from Campaign Diaries:

That should not only also guarantee Democrats not suffer the same fate as in KS-3 or LA-3, open seats in which they are struggling to field a candidate, but that they will have a solid contender. Names that are mentioned include Mark Singel, who served as Lieutenant Governor from 1987 to 1995; state Senator John Wozniak, who has represented Johnstown since 1996; state Senator Richard Kasunic, who has been serving since 1994; state Rep. Bryan Barbin; state Rep. Tad Harhai; and still many other state legislators. (State Rep. Bill DeWeese, who once served as state Speaker, probably cannot run given the criminal charges he is now facing.) The Republican bench is far weaker. The GOP has two candidates currently in the race, Tim Burns and William Russell, its 2008 nominee whom conservatives rallied behind late in the cycle; the NRCC spent more than $1 million on his behalf in the campaign's final weeks.

UPDATE: The WashPost's Chris Cillizza says the special won't be a GOP slam dunk, despite some of the trends going their way. Why? A May 18 primary helps Democrats with turnout; party elites will choose the candidates, which could turn off the grass-roots; there are plenty of Dem candidates; national Dems have more money; and Dems have a good track record on congressional specials.

Council to study snow

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

As sure as the sun will (some day) rise in the East, Pittsburgh City Council is going to complain about snow removal. (We said this would happen here, and talked about it more earlier today.)

Here's the latest on a new council task force -- with an offer from CMU to design a new snow removal tracking system for the city.

Will Luke Ravenstahl take up Jared Cohon (who is on his post-student tax city pension fund task force) on the offer?

UPDATE: Ravenstahl calls out all 630 firefighters and 20 private contractors to help battle tonight's second-wave storm.

Above: The snow tracking system used by Howard County, Maryland, west of Baltimore.

Mellow to retire

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

Senate Minority Leader Robert Mellow, D-Lackawanna, is retiring at the end of the year. From his office:

Harrisburg, February 9, 2010 -- Senator Robert J. Mellow, the Pennsylvania State Senate's longest-serving member and its highest-ranking Democrat, announced today that he will not seek re-election. With a lengthy record of public service, Senator Mellow's distinguished career includes two terms as Senate President Pro Tempore, the third-highest constitutional office in the Commonwealth. 

"It has been my profound personal honor to serve the citizens of Pennsylvania.  It has literally been my life's work. I am deeply grateful for the trust that my friends and neighbors from northeastern Pennsylvania have shown me by electing and re-electing me to work for them.  We have accomplished many great things together," Mellow said. 

"I have fought hard for the good people of Pennsylvania, and I have loved every minute of being in the arena.  My constituents have shown me that if we stand together with honor and integrity, there is nothing that we cannot accomplish as citizens of this great state. I always knew there would come a time to make this difficult decision. I am confident I have accomplished all I set out to do for the people of Pennsylvania. I leave public life knowing that I have always strived to meet a high standard of excellence. I know in my heart that we have climbed that mountain. Now while at the top, it is time to move on to different priorities."

More on Rendell budget

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

A pdf of the budget is here.

The (2-year) War on Snow

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

Funny post here from Maria at 2 Political Junkies on the "war on snow" the mayor declared . . . in February 2008.

Photo illustration from 2PJs

GOP still up in Ohio guv race

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

McKees Rocks native John Kasich still has a lead over the leading Dem gubernatorial candidate in Ohio, Rassmussen reports, though his lead has been slipping:

The story's the same again this month in the Ohio gubernatorial contest, with Republican challenger John Kasich holding a modest lead over incumbent Democrat Ted Strickland.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in the state finds Kasich leading Strickland 47% to 41%. Faced with that match-up, five percent (5%) like some other candidate, and eight percent (8%) remain undecided.

Last month, Kasich posted a 47% to 40% lead over Strickland and in early December was ahead 48% to 39%.

Republican Rob Portman also still has narrow leads over his two chief Democratic opponents for the seat being vacated by GOP Senator George Voinovich in Ohio.

Tracking the winter political fallout

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

Back to the snow, and the question of when or if Luke Ravenstahl will face political fallout from the city's response. The P-G covers that in Rich Lord's story today and in this story from Mackenzie Carpenter, which notes this talking-point:

By mid-Monday, city officials seemed to sense that a public relations debacle might be in the making. Like pothole patching and garbage collection, snow removal is perceived as central to a mayor's job, and, if improperly handled, become a political nightmare -- just ask former Chicago Mayor Michael Bilandic, who lost the 1979 mayoral primary after a series of major snowstorms paralyzed the city.

Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, who left town Friday to celebrate his 30th birthday in the Laurel Highlands and got stranded there, told reporters that forecasts that morning called for 4 to 8 inches of snow. Soon after he got back in town Sunday he was at the city's Emergency Operations Center talking -- he noted pointedly -- to the same people he had been talking to all weekend by computer and phone while at the Laurel Highlands.

In a news release announcing interim approval of an emergency disaster declaration, Pittsburgh City Council President Darlene Harris reminded Pittsburghers that the city's 1,200 miles of narrow and sloped city streets means crews must plow snow the same distance "from here to Miami."

Here's Chris Briem -- that's his graph to the right -- on years of cuts to the city workforce:

Beyond the criticisms most everyone is talking about, it probably is fair to note that you can't really expect the city's ability to respond to snow to be the same now as it has been in the past.  The successive downsizing of the city's workforce can't not have an impact on it's ability to surge work in circumstances like this. Uber-efficiency has it's costs and probably should be part of the discussion as we debate the city's budget.

Here's praise from Agent Ska for new councilwoman Natalia Rudiak, who issued an email to constituents that contained this:

First, while it is evident that the City needs to change its emergency management system given the slow response over the last four days, our public works employees have been working 12 hour shifts, plowing more than 1,000 miles of City streets. I know how frustrating this storm has been, I was without power and my car is still banked in snow. But the men and woman who are working on the ground have been working very long and very hard hours to try to get the City up and running again and I applaud their efforts.

And we never thought we'd say this, but here's Chris Potter praising the Port Authority and Twitter.

Roddy on Murtha in Slate

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

You've read Dennis' obit. Here is the Cambria County native writing on Jack Murtha in Slate:

The one promise Jack Murtha broke to me was to explain Abscam. The night the news broke that a group of congressmen had been caught boozing up, taking bribes-one tucked the money into his suit and asked, "Does it show?"-Murtha seemed the most implausible of the bribed.

Here's the end of the essay:

He put it to me this way last year, in the midst of a federal investigation in which he was the clear target: "I have no idea why they're going after these lobbyists. Lobbyists play an important part. These forms that they have to fill out, the small companies, the small universities, the small corporations, the small hospitals, are complicated. When you come to Washington you don't just come and say 'I need something.' You don't come to a member and say 'Look, here's what I need.' You gotta fill out forms. You have to know exactly where the forms are."

In short, to his dying day, John Murtha saw lobbyists as clerks, Washington as the bank, and himself as little more than a conduit for the flow of those dollars back to his district. For all that clarity, nobody of virtue understood him. And nobody in his district could understand why anybody beyond the Alleghenies saw him as anything other than Robin Hood with a per diem.

Murtha was not the last of his kind. He was just the last of his kind who knew how to be that kind.

Murtha's virtue and vice

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

The Post-Gazette's Dennis Roddy:

John P. Murtha, the powerful dean of Pennsylvania's congressional delegation who survived scandal and seismic political shifts to become the longest-serving U.S. House member from the state, died Monday afternoon in Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington from complications following gallbladder surgery. He was 77.

Johnstown Tribune Democrat obit.

Real Clear Politics' David Paul Kuhn: "Jack Murtha was the virtue and vice of Congress."

Wall St. Journal obit.

NYT obit.

Washington Post coverage.

Huffington Post: The Murthquake

Almanac of American Politics full profile.

The Nation on Murtha's opposition to the war in Iraq -- and his once-deep ties to Republicans.

Red State says Murtha "departs this world long after having departed the Corps." Another Red State diary here.

Rendell slices sales tax exemptions

Timothy McNulty | February 9, 2010

Gov. Ed Rendell is proposing a $27.8 billion state budget that lowers the statewide sales tax to 4 percent by cutting out a bunch of exemptions (while keeping exemptions for food/clothing/drugs).

The current 6 percent tax is an extra 1 percent in Allegheny County and 2 percent in Philadelphia.

From Tom Barnes in Harrisburg:

HARRISBURG -- Gov. Ed Rendell today proposed a general fund budget of just over $29 billion for the fiscal year that starts July 1, an increase of more than 4 percent over the current year's $27.8 billion spending package.

He isn't calling for increases in the state income tax rate, but he is calling for dramatic changes in the state's 6 percent sales tax -- starting in September, if the Legislature agrees. He said the changes are needed so the state can compensate for looming budget deficits in 2011 and 2012.

He wants to lower the sales tax to 4 percent statewide (with an additional 1 percent for Allegheny County and an extra 2 percent in Philadelphia), but remove a whopping 74 current exemptions "to make for a fairer tax system."

Exemptions to be removed include services attorneys, architects and accounts and the sales of caskets, flags, magazines, direct mail and catalogs, dry cleaning, personal hygiene products, school buses, trout, fish feed, wrapping/package supplies, coal, rail transport equipment, firewood, candy/gum, airline catering, investment coins and metal bullion and helicopters.

Remaining exempt from the sales tax would be sales of food, clothing, prescription drugs, manufacturer processing, agriculture machinery and nonprofit cultural activities.