Observations From the Road Vol. 2

Just returned from a trip to Philly to go apartment-hunting. Even though I've lived in Pennsylvania on 3 different occasions, I was still reminded of just how different a place PA is from New York. Not just the archaic liquor laws, of course.

For one thing, Pennsylvania doesn't know how to handle a late state budget. We here in New York could tell them a thing or two about that practice, considering we didn't pass a budget on time for a good 20 years in a row. PA has decided to hoard money in order to get through this crisis, and among other things, it means that state employees are not getting paid right now. They've had to open up food banks for these now-destitute workers, and they're protesting loudly for their paychecks in Harrisburg this week. This of course would never happen in New York, because Danny Donahue and CSEA would break every legislator's legs before they would go without a paycheck. On the other hand, I'm sure the New York state Senate is wishing they could have had the PR opportunity to show them having to open up a food bank for themselves once Governor Patterson cut off their paychecks during the standoff they just went through.

So PA is in a shambles right now, but I can tell you that they're still getting money coming in, because the Pennsylvania Turnpike is nothing more than an exercise in literal highway robbery. It costs you $6.60 in tolls to go 100 miles on the turnpike. By comparison, going from the I-481 exit in Syracuse to Albany on the Thruway (which I will be doing next week en route to Boston) is 130 miles and sets you back $5.80, and that's with the two toll hikes the Thruway Authority has shoved through in the past few years. The sad thing is this gives the Thruway Authority the excuse to say 1) they still charge less than other toll highways, and 2) they can raise the tolls yet again when/if they feel like it.

On the other hand, for all the troubles PA and NY have with their governments, at least they're not New Jersey. 44 people got rounded up in a massive corruption crackdown last week in the great Garden State, including THREE MAYORS and a state legislator. This just goes to show you that any time you think your state is inept at handling its own affairs, you can just look at New Jersey and feel a lot better... that is, unless you actually live in New Jersey. Let's not forget that the governor of New Jersey also recently floated the idea of naming a reality TV show winner as his lieutenant governor. Ahhh, New Jersey, where it's free to come into the state but you have to pay to leave.

I also have to take issue with the quality of the traffic reports in Philadelphia. Yeah, the big news radio station in town is good at getting the info about accidents out there, but apparently when you're crawling along at 30 mph on the Schuylkill Expressway, that's considered "no problems". I don't consider that to be "no problems"... it is very much a problem, and then when we get shoved into one lane in a construction zone due to a traffic incident, thus causing us to pretty much come to a dead stop for several minutes, it is DEFINITELY not considered "no problems on the Schuylkill". You have traffic cameras everywhere (at least you seem to mention them a lot), how about you USE them?

Over the course of the past couple days, I have also had to hear and see more examples of the total ineptitude of the Republican Party. First we were treated to ads by the Republican National Committee attacking New York state senator Darrel Aubertine because he was the odds-on favorite to run for the congressional seat being vacated by John McHugh when he becomes Secretary of the Army. Only Aubertine chose not to run... and the RNC continued running the attack ads AFTER Aubertine announced he wasn't running. Then they started running ads attacking Democratic congressmen over the upcoming health care vote in the House. First of all, are any of these people going to take any organized effort by the other party seriously? Secondly, when the RNC ran an ad in the Scranton area attacking local congressman Paul Kanjorski... it called him "Pete Kanjorski". Oops. I got to hear this ad and the local Scranton talk show host laughing herself silly over the mess-up on my way down to Philly. Is it any wonder that national Republicans are becoming an endangered species?

Meanwhile, the latest "non-issue" to become a rallying cry for Democrats in their attempts to make national Republicans extinct is actually an old non-issue... President Obama's citizenship. This was floated around by right-wingers during the campaign, never amounted to much of anything, and was quickly laughed off as it should have been. Now, a good 7 months after this story was put to bed, it has come roaring back. Why? Because the "leader of the Republican Party", Mr. Limbaugh brought it up on his show. And now, despite the fact that this remains a very dead, very non-issue, it's been brought back by left-wingers eager to attach this to all Republicans. First, I got a call during one of the shows I produce from a frequent left-wing P-S letter-writer claiming that these so-called "birthers" are out of control, then a Philadelphia Daily News columnist goes after the supposed large numbers of GOP congressmen and mouthpieces who believe this ridiculous argument. Apparently, if the RNC does not make a statement saying, "THIS IS NOT AN ISSUE, WE DON'T BELIEVE THIS," in the eyes of liberals, the GOP gives tacit consent to wackjobs.

And so it is that we have the latest salvo in the attempt to ram through health care, cap-and-trade, and all the other Democratic legislation by painting the entire Republican Party with the broad brush of being just a bunch of extremist, Rush Limbaugh-repeating ne'er-do-wells who simply want the president to fail. However, it's like I've said before, why do we Republicans keep helping them out by giving them all these things to attack us with? It's seriously like we're in a race against the Democrats to see who can destroy us first.