Early Returns

Paging St. Patrick . . .

Timothy McNulty — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 20:38:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 6, 2009

Florida congressman Tom Rooney, nephew of Dan, really doesn't like pythons. His office gave the photo above to Politico, which writes this:

Today, Rooney is telling everyone who will listen (mainly those attending the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security hearing) about how these pythons are destructive killers and need to be stopped from entering our country.

"There are estimates of over 100,000 Burmese Pythons currently living in the Everglades. These vicious predators can grow six to eight feet in a single year, and prey on the wading birds, and other wildlife we are working so diligently to save. They thrive on our sub-tropic climate and abundant food resources," he said in a statement today.

The problem is a very real and very big -- here's part of the abstract from a New Yorker story on it earlier this year:

More recently, a thriving exotic-wildlife trade sent a ragged parade of escapees into the wild: parakeets, peafowl, swamp eels, and squirrel monkeys. Florida now has more exotic lizard species than there are natives in the entire Southeast. Writer interviews Skip Snow, a wildlife biologist at Everglades National Park, and its chief hunter of Burmese pythons. Snow isn't sure how the Pythons got to the Everglades. He, for one, doesn't buy the "frisbee" theory that Hurricane Andrew carried them there. Burmese pythons began to appear in the park in 1995. One January morning in 2003, a group of tourists came across a full-grown alligator and an adult python fighting. Within months, Snow was finding pythons of all sizes. He and his colleagues have found more than nine hundred so far. The Everglades, at capacity, could hold as many as a hundred and forty thousand.

Mayoral vote by district, worth a look

Timothy McNulty — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:56:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 6, 2009

Chris Briem forwards this cool map from the people at the Pittsburgh Neighborhood and Community Information System (which is a little too big to post here) showing the voting by district for the three mayoral candidates Tuesday.

We all know Ravenstahl won every ward, but dig deeper (something that the 14th ward Democratic chair mentioned yesterday) and you'll see a big pocket of support for Harris in the East End and bits for Acklin there and elsewhere.

Friday odds, ends

Timothy McNulty — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:33:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 6, 2009

Don't miss:

Roddy and Mauriello on a grand jury looking at charges against former House speaker John Perzel

Dan Majors on Allegheny Council Council member getting angry about an amendment to a $5 million property sale, after admitting they approved it without reading it

Dan Malloy on Pittsburgh tea party protesters in DC yesterday, and their meeting with Jason Altmire on tomorrow's health care vote in the House

Toomey: I'm running against Sestak

Timothy McNulty — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:20:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 6, 2009

Pat Toomey takes a subtle dig at Arlen Specter in the Post-Gazette today -- by not mentioning him at all.

Toomey writes an op-ed in today's PG critcizing cap-and-trade legislation approved by a Senate committee yesterday, saying it will hurt Pa's coal, gas and manufacturing industries. Specter cast a vote in favor of the procedural motion, but Toomey doesn't even bother to mention that -- he goes after Joe Sestak instead, "against whom I am running for the U.S. Senate":

With Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's blessing, California Sen. Barbara Boxer and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry introduced a 923-page draft of legislation to set up a so-called cap-and-trade program. The program would impose an onerous indirect tax on the production and consumption of carbon-based energy. It would cap the amount of carbon dioxide businesses could emit, imposing a penalty when they exceed the cap, and would require that carbon emissions be cut by 20 percent of 2005 levels by 2020.

. . . The cap-and-trade proposal is so harmful to Pennsylvania it has garnered bipartisan opposition across the state. When a version of the bill passed the House of Representatives last June, one third of Pennsylvania Democratic congressmen joined all Pennsylvania Republicans in voting against it. In all, 44 House Democrats across the country opposed the bill in a truly bipartisan effort to stop this massive job-killer.

Sadly, that bipartisan group does not include Pennsylvania Rep. Joe Sestak, against whom I am running for the U.S. Senate, who voted for the bill and even expressed regret that it did not go far enough.

Senate proposes ethics rules (you read that right)

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:31:00 GMT

Tom Barnes | November 5, 2009

HARRISBURG -- Republican and Democratic leaders of the state Senate today proposed new "Rules of Ethical Conduct'' for state senators.

"Events over the past several years have shown that we need to formalize a clear set of rules so that everyone understands what is permissible and what is not,'' said Senate President Pro Tem Joe Scarnati, R-Jefferson, who developed the proposed rules with Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi, R-Delaware, and Senate Democratic leader Bob Mellow of Lackawanna.

The rules say:

--no senate employee may conduct any political campaign activity on senate work time. Allegations that political work was done in 2006 by House employees on state time and at taxpayer expense have led to charges against 12 former House Democratic legislators and staffers in an investigation known as Bonusgate.

--no political campaign activity may be conducted in a senate office or with senate resources.

--there can be no solicitation or receipt of campaign contributions on senate work time or with senate resources.

--no senate employee may be required to perform campaign activites or to make campaign contributions.

--no senate employee may serve as an officer on a campaign committee or a campaign finance committee on behalf of any senator or senate candidate.

--senate mailing lists and email lists may only be used for legislative purposes -- not campaign purposes.

--no senate-funded newsletters may be sent out to constituents within 60 days of an election.

A public hearing will be held to get public opinions on the proposed rules before they are considered by the full Senate.

Palin's visit is Nov. 21

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:23:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 5, 2009

In case you missed the update in today's paper, Sarah Palin will be at the Sam's Club in Washington, Pa., on Saturday, Nov. 21.

On turnout

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:44:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 5, 2009

We post the below from Larry Sabato at the UVa Center of Politics -- on turnout in Va and NJ -- as it pertains to discussions of turnout (and GOP wins, and what it means for 2010) generally on Tuesday:

Turnout played a huge role in the outcomes in both NJ and VA, with Republicans showing up in droves and Democrats going fishing, at least to some degree. In Virginia, one result of absentee Democrats was the lowest voter turnout for a gubernatorial election in the state's modern two-party history (1969 to 2009). The 2009 turnout of 39.8 percent of the registered voters was the lowest in forty years. Even with all the population growth since 2005, the absolute voter turnout in 2009 (1.97 million) fell below that of four years ago (2.0 million). And the electorate was barely more than half that of 2008 (3.7 million). Astounding.

. . . Does anybody doubt African-Americans weren't engaged in this week's elections? Here's some proof for remaining doubters, in a sampling of heavily black precincts around Virginia. Even though Creigh Deeds received a larger percentage of the black vote (93 percent) than the previous Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Tim Kaine, in 2005 (90 percent), the turnout was miserable for Deeds--more than 10 full percentage points lower. He received many fewer African-American votes than Kaine, despite near-unanimous backing from blacks who cast a ballot.

(H/t to CQ Politics)

14th Ward chair: Pick your battles

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:58:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 5, 2009

The chair of the 14th Ward Democratic committee, Barbara Daly Danko, responds below to criticism (see here and here) of voter apathy and turnout in her Squirrel Hill-area district in Tuesday's mayor's race.

Just thought your City Paper posting Wards 7 and 14: WTF, and Early Returns blog entry The fightin' 14th (or not), deserved some kind of feedback . . . first let me note that yes, Acklin and Harris both currently live in the 14th Ward - Acklin in 14-21, and Harris in 14-2. To say because of that, the ward should have supported them is a huge leap - I think their combined legal residence in 14 is probably less than 5 years. Dok for that matter seemed to claim residency in Shadyside, Oakland, the Mexican War Streets, etc, so he really wasn't by any stretch a hometown guy in 14. For the record both even lost their own districts as I don't think most voters knew them. In addition, prior to our September ward meeting, neither one had ever met most of the committee people, so to expect the ward to suddenly be out championing the cause through either of these two less than formidable candidates is unrealistic. 14th Warders have lives, too, and many other commitments . . . and generally people don't want to put a lot of time and credibility into races that are perceived to be over . . . and most of us know from experience which battles are worth the fight. Sure, a lot of us could have put a lot more into this race and upped the numbers for either or both of these candidates, but what would that get us? A phyrric victory in the 14th Ward isn't really of benefit to any of us - maybe that's the difference between me and our former ward chair. Give me and the ward a good viable experienced candidate and we'll be there. For better or worse, we have to operate within the party apparatus and there is always another race down the road - as for myself, I'm gearing up for the Sestak race - I think that's a fight worth my time.

Re our turnout, we still did way better than the countywide average, and that's with all of the non-voting students who stay on our rolls long after they've left town. And if I were Luke I would take little comfort in the fact that in a ward that is so heavily Democratic (roughly 80%), he ended up with 38% of the vote. That means that well over half of the Democratic voters opted for someone other than the Democrat. FYI, Dok did win or tie in 17 of our 41 districts - almost all North of Forbes in Squirrel Hill. Luke cleaned up (win or tie in 22 districts) in Lower Squirrel Hill (near Minadeo) Swisshelm Park and North Point Breeze. BTW weren't Luke's people talking about a victory with 70% of the vote just a few days ago?

I guess what I really want to say harkens back to a piece of parenting advice I got a long time ago: "pick your battles." This one wasn't worth it.

Barbara Daly Danko Chair 14th Ward Democratic Committee

Knox fights for Dem progressive tag

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:45:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 5, 2009

Tom Knox appears to be fighting Joe Hoeffel for that progressive tag among the Dem gubernatorial candidates.

The Philadelphia businessman is releasing a state government reform plan today designed with the help of Common Cause that calls for campaign finance reform, eliminating walking-around-money (WAMs) and reducing the size of the legislature. The main planks, according to a news release, include:

Enactment of state political campaign contribution limitations;
Prohibition of "gifts" and "free meals" to all state officials from lobbyists;
Elimination of the practice of "pay-to-play" in state and local contracting;
Require public officials to resign prior campaigning for another elective office;
Implement "performance audits" to ensure government programs actually work;
End "revolving door" of state regulators;
Mandate annual "ethics training" for legislative and public officials;
Eliminate secret legislative spending accounts - "WAMS";
Establish ethics reporting hotline;
Enact legislative "gavel bill" designation;
Provide for the merit selection of judges; and,
Reducing the size of the State Legislature.

Also from his statement:

"Because I am not a career politician, I have no stake protecting Harrisburg's business-as-usual culture," said Knox. "If elected Governor, it will be my priority to work to restore public confidence in the ability of state government to respond to the needs of families, and not just the demands of politically connected special interests."

Knox called Pennsylvania's embarrassing budget process "symptomatic" of a broken political system that needs reform.

Next day reactions

Timothy McNulty — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:12:00 GMT

Timothy McNulty | November 5, 2009

Two nice election day reacts today from Rich Lord and Jim O'Toole.

Lord on the mayor's race:

For 76 years, Democrats have won Pittsburgh mayoral elections. The lone asterisk sits beside the 1977 election, when Democratic Mayor Richard Caliguiri sat out the primary, then ran as an independent to beat Democratic nominee Tom Foerster.

Other than the 1977 race, no Democratic nominee has gotten less than 60 percent of the vote since 1945. The average share of the vote garnered by all Democratic nominees since 1933 is 65.9 percent.

O'Toole on GOP gains statewide:

With an overall statewide turnout estimated at 20 percent, the voting dearth extended across the political spectrum but seemed to be particularly acute among Democrats.

The apparent turnout disparity in favor of the GOP raises questions about the staying power and effectiveness of a Democratic registration advantage that surged over the last two election cycles. [Republican consultant John] Brabender argued that the intensity of voter interest, a Democratic edge in the state in 2006 and 2008, was shifting back to his party.

"What happened yesterday was that a lot of Republicans showed up and a lot of Democrats didn't -- we hadn't seen that in a while," he said.