04: "Anti-Gambling Republican for Governor!"

It’s way too early to issue an endorsement in the campaign for Governor of Pennsylvania next year, but this blogger will present campaign information about worthy candidates as they appear.

Jim Panyard is the first. Here is a candidate who could get this blogger’s vote. That said, there are some issues that do not fit personally with this blogger’s views, such as holding the line on state spending, but they are close. Frankly, the state civil service employees deserve a better treatment than they have had at the hands of “Fast Eddie” Rendell. Most of the rest of the issues are a fit.

Primarily, the willingness to repeal the gaming bill, Act 71 of 2004 is very impressive, and tickles this blogger’s heart. It’s a bill that has already brought problems with the law that are nothing to compare to what is coming, and what has not been exposed yet. That needs to be accomplished next year as early as possible, and certainly, action must be taken before licenses are granted. One method would be to have the legislature amend Act 71 to put a freeze on the issuance of licenses for one year, to give the legislature time under a new governor to gather the votes for repeal. And make no mistake about it, we mean full repeal.

Take a peek at Jim Panyard at his website. Click here: http://www.panyard4gov.com/. See for yourself.

36 W. Main Street, Mechanicsburg, PA 17055
(717)-791-9950 or (717) 571-7898
http://www.panyard4gov.com/


December 5, 2005


PANYARD FIRST GOVERNOR CANDIDATE
TO BACK SLOTS REPEAL EFFORT

(HARRISBURG, PA) Jim Panyard today became the first Republican gubernatorial candidate to call for the repeal of Act 71, the state’s new slot machine law, and endorse efforts to repeal the measure.

“The efforts of State Rep. Paul Clymer (R- Bucks County), conservative lawmakers, the Pennsylvania Family Institute, Pennsylvanians Against Gambling Expansion and others to repeal the slots measure should be applauded and supported by thoughtful Pennsylvanians,” Panyard said.

Clymer and others are to hold a press conference tomorrow to announce their intentions to repeal the slot machine gambling law, which would bring 61,000 slot machines to the commonwealth.

When he announced his candidacy for governor on Sept. 29, the retired CEO of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers’ Association, said he would never sign any expansion of gambling in Pennsylvania into law and, if the opportunity presented itself during his term as governor, he would sign a repeal bill.

“I think since the bill was passed on a Sunday morning, under cover of darkness, just like the recently attempted pay grab by the General Assembly, the citizens of Pennsylvania have awakened to how much this potential scarring of the state will mean to vested interests and how little it will benefit property taxpayers,” Panyard said.

“Slot machine gambling is only the foot in the door for major, unsavory interests. Since the measure has passed, news accounts of federal investigations of potential suppliers, the background of the state Gaming Commission’s Executive Director, the failure to sell licenses at fair market value, the meager potential property tax cuts for property owners and the fact that 80 percent of the state’s 501 school districts want no part of it, have been sending a clear message to citizens,” Panyard said.

“Add to that, the fact that tens of thousands of Pennsylvanians becoming gambling addicts will result in bankruptcies, broken homes and divorces, enforcement problems and suicides, and it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out Act 71, if it stays, will scar Pennsylvania forever,” Panyard said.

“I find it hard to believe that Pennsylvanians are willing to risk the lives and futures of their friends and neighbors for the promise of a potential, one-time $200 property tax cut,” Panyard said.

“I salute all who will be involved in the repeal effort and will do whatever I can to be supportive of their efforts. If they fall short, we will try again as soon as I am sworn in as governor,” Panyard said.

Panyard’s announcement was another first in his campaign that has been filled with them. He has been the first candidate in the GOP field seeking the nomination through the May 16 primary to:

- Formally announce his candidacy
- Endorse a Lieutenant Governor candidate (State Rep. Mike Turzai of Allegheny County)
- State that he is 100 percent Pro-Life, with no exceptions
- Call for a freeze on state general operating spending for his four year term
- Promise all of his meetings as governor, aside from security and personnel matters, will be open to a member of the news media.
- Promise he will roll back Executive branch salaries to their year 2000 levels
- Pledge never to sign into law any pay raises for state officers during his term in office
- State his opposition to “same sex” marriage, civil unions and paying benefits to cohabiting couples
- To end “corporate welfare” in Pennsylvania

“I remain curious about my opponents’ positions about these and most other issues. The voters probably are wondering, too,” Panyard said.

“The passage of the slots legislation was another example of the New Monarchy – the governor, the courts and the legislature – doing as they please, without any checks or balances in the decision making process,” Panyard said.

“My goals are to overthrow The New Monarchy, end “business as usual” in Harrisburg and bring principled governance back to our state,” Panyard said.

30

There is much to like about Jim Panyard. It will be interesting to see if any of the other candidates stand up to the gaming money. This blogger is listening.

THE CENTRIST

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs." Albert Einstein

Copyright © 2005, "THE CENTRIST". All Rights Reserved.

03: "A Matter of Ethics – Part 2: The Gaming Act"

03: A Matter of Ethics – Part 2: The Gaming Act

The second case is a bit more involved. It involves the gaming bill, Act 71 of 2004. This gem of ethicless legislation gave us casino gambling in Pennsylvania. While it has not resulted in a single slot machine running legally in the state yet, it has posed a number of ethics problems on varying levels.

First, and foremost, our glorious leader, Governor Edward G. “Fast Eddie” Rendell, has brought us the gambling casinos he promised to the big money folks out in Las Vegas. Originally supposed to be four or five river boats on waterfronts in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Erie, Scranton/Wilkes Barre, and Harrisburg, there will now be eleven casinos, six of which will be “racinos”, located at the state’s six races tracks, and five stand alone casinos, two anchored in Philadelphia, and one in Pittsburgh, with the remaining two allowed to be built anywhere no matter the opposition, no matter the zoning laws. One has been proposed for the Gettysburg area, where it will supposedly draw people from Maryland and West Virginia, which states already have, or soon will have gaming casinos nearby.

The problem is that the legislature and Governor “Fast Eddie” are introducing an industry into the Commonwealth that is hazardous to the health and well being of the citizens of this state. Gambling brings crime with it. It brings addictions with it, often feeding off alcoholism to feed addiction to gambling, or at least to make the gambler more susceptible to losing, and to keep on losing.

Act 71 allows the house and senate leadership to select members of the Gaming Control Board. It also designates the Governor as another person who appoints members to the Gaming Control Board.

These are straight appointments, requiring no confirmation from either legislative body.

This board has, since its inception, cut the State Police out of the vetting process for hiring, conducted closed door meetings to conduct business in violation of the state’s Sunshine Law, and let contracts without any public comment or review. This board is responsible for the vetting of board personnel, contractors, and equipment. Slot machines will be licensed and casinos will be licensed by this board. This board will also make the decision as to where the 5 free standing casinos (not connected to any race track) in the state will be located, and the legislation allows them to totally ignore public sentiment and zoning ordinances.

Anybody smell anything yet?

Lobbyists who regularly ply the halls of the Capitol have suddenly become investor/partners in startup companies required by Act 71 as the “middlemen” who will purchase slot machines from outside the state, and sell them to the 11 casinos in Pennsylvania.

Whew! The smell is getting bad.

A state representative from Philadelphia is being investigated on his efforts to gain a lock on the location of a casino in Philadelphia on land that he owns.

According to Act 71, state legislators are permitted to own a percentage (initially it was 15%) of a casino. These are the same folks who are part of the process to appoint members to the Gaming Control Board.

Man, that stinks!

All the members of the Gaming Control Board are political appointees.

Wow! The smell is getting really bad here.

Six “racinos” (slots parlors at Pennsylvania thoroughbred and harness racing tracks) and 5 free standing casino slot parlors (two mandated in Philadelphia, one in Pittsburgh, and the other two up for grabs, with a strong effort in the Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton area, and another in the Pocono resorts area, while a third one is pushing for a slot parlor with 6,000 machines in it at Gettysburg. Other areas of interest include Erie (but it must be a fair distance from any race tracks so it may not work out there, the resort at Nemacolin along the western Pennsylvania southern border, and outside of Pittsburgh. Odds are, that one will go to either the Poconos or to the A-B-E area, and this blogger guesses the Poconos are a lock.

Resistance at Gettysburg is fierce, organized and international. The local investor group has a real PR problem, and is attempting to sugar coat everything negative about casinos to ram it down the throats of the local residents. They do this by throwing unimaginable numbers around. Hundreds of millions of dollars! Thousands of jobs! And so on. These are things the area does not need. The economy in Adams County is just fine, and unemployment is, and has always been, one of the lowest rates, not only in the state, but in the nation.

Smelling really bad now.

So, what’s the rest of the good news on gaming in Pennsylvania? Well, there’s this: gambling in Pennsylvania will increase the number of bankruptcies, suicides, addicted gamblers, alcoholics, divorces, broken homes, and crimes, including robbery, drunken driving arrests, (and accidents), neglected and abused children, spousal abuse, and other assorted problems associated with social breakdown. The costs of social services will skyrocket out of sight as family after family breaks down as a result of legalized gambling. Prostitution will explode, as will sexually transmitted diseases. Oh, the gaming industry will not import prostitutes, but there are plenty of folks who will move into an area near a casino and take advantage of “the traffic”.

None of this addresses the massive costs in infrastructure, the ongoing maintenance of which will cost taxpayers a bundle, certainly far more than they are paying now. Service will go up, too, as in fire, police, and ambulance services, hospitalizations, and incarcerations. Police in particular will have to have force increases, or departments started from scratch. That is more cost thrust on the taxpayers.

Boy it smells like something died here.

Something did die here. The souls of the good people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania died because they failed to hold their government officials accountable, and those officials literally sold them out to the gambling industry, in exchange for massive infusions of campaign cash.

This is how your legislators, your judges, and your Governor and his administration protect you, the citizens of the Commonwealth. They use the new ethics, the ethics of greed, to get theirs, while you pay the price. And unless you do something about it NOW, you will pay, not just in cash, but in the priceless commodity of the human soul.

THE CENTRIST

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. " Albert Einstein

Copyright © 2005, "THE CENTRIST" . All Rights Reserved.

02: "A Matter of Ethics – Part 1: The Pay Raise"

There are two consuming issues in Pennsylvania today, both involve the three branches of state government, and both involve matters of ethics.

The online dictionary WordNet defines ethics two ways:

The noun ethics has 2 meanings:

Meaning #1: motivation based on ideas of right and wrong Synonyms: ethical motive, morals, morality

Meaning #2: the philosophical study of moral values and rules Synonym: moral philosophy

[WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All
rights reserved.]

Apparently, there is no clear, standard understanding of what ethics are, how they are applied, and how important a value they are among all elected members of Pennsylvania’s three branches of government. Apparently, winning an election, or getting a judicial appointment is now tantamount to winning a lottery. They have come to believe they have the full permission of the citizens of the Commonwealth to do whatever they please. The legislature, the Governor’s office, and the judiciary have become the biggest combined set of rationalizers in the country. There is no clear understanding of the difference between right and wrong. Elect someone to office, and that goes out the door.

For four months the state legislature, the governor and the judiciary rationalized giving themselves a sneaky, and illegal pay raise. Only when voter anger resulted in the ouster of one sitting Supreme Court Justice and the near ouster of another, did they finally take action. They repealed the pay raise. And while they were doing that with one hand, the other hand was giving themselves another raise, that took effect today. Further, although there is a movement afoot in both houses of the General Assembly to give back any of the early payments of the pay raise taken (illegally) via the so called “unvouchered expense”, there are still holdouts who refuse to give the money back. There are articles today across the state (Philadelphia Inquirer, Harrisburg Patriot News, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review : click on the newspaper’s name to read the articles) detailing who has and who has not repaid the “unvouchered expenses” taken between July and November. The list of those who have NOT agreed to repay the stolen money includes is amazing, and the excuses are even more amazing.

Senator Joe Conti (R-Bucks) complained he had used his “unvouchered expense” money to install a new water heater and couldn’t give it back. Well, first there is the matter of his apparent gold-plated water heater. Your average water heater, gas or electric, goes for about $300-$500 dollars, not the several thousand dollars Conti got. Conti’s excuse for not repaying the money? He can't take out the already installed water heater! A Philadelphia Inquirer columnist, John Grogan, gathered a team of volunteers to help remove the “gold lined” water heater. Conti relented, and agreed to repay the state.

Senate Minority Leader Robert Mellow (D-Lackawanna), claimed there was no way to give the money back, in spite of the fact that at least 30 members of the State House of Representatives had already found a way to do so. Duh! And he’s leadership?

Effective today, all the legislators, the Governor, and his administration, and the Commonwealth Court judges all get a raise of 3.6%, which I can guarantee is more of a raise than the average civil service state employee will be getting in January. Governor Edward “Fast Eddie” Rendell hates unions, and has been squeezing the state unions (PSSU, AFSCME) so hard you can hear the buffalos squealing since coming into office two years ago.

And a Commonwealth Court Judge, Senior Judge James R. Kelly, today threw out the law suit challenging the legality of the pay raise in an effort to get the manner in which it was done declared illegal for future occasions. Perhaps the Judge felt stiffed that he only got the 3.6% raise, and not the whopper he was voted last July by the legislature, but of course, none of our judges would rule on that basis! Life still exists for the lawsuit, however, as the man filing it, Gene Stilp a local activist in the Harrisburg area, has asked the state Supreme Court to take over the case. This is the same state Supreme Court containing the now lame duck Justice Russell Nigro, voted out by the fury of the voters over the pay raise issue, among other things, in the recent election, and containing the almost lame duck Justice Sandra S. Newman, and containing the Chief Justice Ralph Cappy, who gave free legal advice to the legislative leadership encouraging them to pass the pay raise on July 7. Talk about the fox and the henhouse! Who is going to recuse on this case?

The ethics involved here are quite simple: Don’t steal. And if you do steal, then when you are caught, don’t squeal, give it back. Right away. And for God’s sake, do not try to defend your actions! But most importantly, don’t steal in the first place!

The Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Article 2, Section 8 details plainly the law on compensation for the legislature:

Compensation
Section 8.
The members of the General Assembly shall receive such salary and mileage for regular and special sessions as shall be fixed by law, and no other compensation whatever, whether for service upon committee or otherwise. No member of either House shall during the term for which he may have been elected, receive any increase of salary, or mileage, under any law passed during such term.

Now, I don’t know about you, but that seems pretty much cut and dried to me. Salary and mileage. No other compensation whatever, whether for service upon committee or otherwise.

That means, no unvouchered expenses, no per diem, and nothing extra for service on a committee, and that means no extra salary for being a committee chairman, or a member of the house leadership.

Further, no member of the house can collect on a raise during the term in which it was passed.

That is crystal clear.

Gene Stilp is arguing the pay raise was unconstitutional because it was in clear violation of this section of the state Constitution.

The legislature passed the pay raise in this session, and immediately began taking the raise in the (unconstitutional) form of unvouchered expenses. Members who voted against the pay raise were punished by losing their committee leadership assignments and thereby losing extra money being (unconstitutionally) paid to them, said monies going (unconstitutionally) instead to the new committee leaders who DID vote for the pay raise! There are legislators as close as Lebanon and Lancaster (unconstitutionally) taking a per diem payment of up to $129 per day, for no other reason than because they can, and feel entitled to it, even though they live within the nominal 50 mile limit. I see nothing in Section 8 that says a word about per diem expenses.

Now, what in the world was Judge Kelly thinking when he threw out that lawsuit?

THE CENTRIST

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. " Albert Einstein

Copyright © 2005, "THE CENTRIST" . All Rights Reserved.

01: "What makes ‘Denny Democrat’ tick?"

In this essay, we will endeavor to plumb the depths of the liberal strategy for the 21st century. In an effort to fathom what it is that makes ‘Denny Democrat’ tick, we must define who (or what) ‘Denny Democrat’ is. ‘Denny Democrat”, or DD for short, is, typically, an urban-centric, progressive individual who clings to the liberal side of things because they espouse a certain distaste and distrust for free market ideology. Now, before you go off half-cocked, understand this: we need DD in this world. ‘Denny Democrat’ provides political balance, and without political balance from DD, we would slide inexorably to the right, and into the extreme. Conversely, DD needs the Republicans for political balance because without that balance, we would slide inexorably to the left.

This is a basic tenet of political philosophy that, unfortunately, has been totally subverted by the extreme left wing of the Democratic Party. Starting during the 2004 primary campaigns, the leading Democratic candidates took their lead from “Hollerin’ Howard Dean”. His screaming rants against President Bush, and all Republicans became a daily rallying cry of the Democrats, and the liberal media. Before you knew it, Hollerin’ Howard was serving as a role model for such Progressive luminaries as “Jivin’ John Kerry”, and ‘Jovial John Edwards’.

State of the Union by Carl Moore ©2005 Creators Syndicate

For the past twenty-two months, we have been subjected to daily, nightly and sometimes hourly rants from leading Democrats like Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Diane Feinstein, Teddy Kennedy, and an assortment of lesser lights, all eager to get face time on the tube, and sound-bites on the radio. This highly orchestrated campaign is based on the old adage that if you throw enough crap against the wall, some of it is going to stick.

It took about three months of nightly coverage by the networks for the media and the press to jump on the bandwagon. Suddenly, they were a part of it. Here was their opportunity to reprise their role from the Vietnam era. Nightly pictures of bombings and their results, major coverage of kidnappings and beheadings, and a strict and highly visible accounting of U.S. war dead, and suddenly, the blue-thumbs of the Iraqi voters last winter are forgotten. No longer do we hear about the Iraqi businesses that have reopened, or started up, nor do we hear of the schools that are in operation, power plants, water supplies - in short, we no longer hear of the return to normal life. Welcome to the re-Vietnamization of our national will.

This shrill assault on the President, is patently false, baseless, and replete with lies after lie. So, why are we forced to go through this? The answer is simple: The Democratic Party is bankrupt of ideas, ideals, and integrity. They have nothing positive to offer to the nation. Thus they commit to the negativism and defeatism of what is, in reality, a national success.

Success? Yes, indeed – success. By far, the greatest majority of people in Iraq want nothing more than to get on with the rebuilding of their country. They are satisfied with their march toward democracy, and the liberty they have experienced since the fall of Saddam Hussein has proved to be very heady stuff. They are not happy with the insurgency. They recognize that it is the insurgency keeping American troops in Iraq, not a wish to remain as controlling occupiers.

In Afghanistan, democracy has taken hold, and the Taliban is testing its grip. Meanwhile, the hunt of Bin Laden continues.

Being sandwiched between two Arab democracies has Iran flexing its muscle as a warning to the world, keep your hands off. What they fail to realize is that the world will not allow them to become a nuclear power.

Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Madison and Monroe were faced with the daunting task of seeing the brand new experiment in democracy through its first generation. Jackson saw the first threat of disunion, and faced it down with his personal strengths. No president can match Abraham Lincoln for what he accomplished in just over one term, when faced with secession in the months before his inauguration. Franklin Roosevelt served extra terms in the Whitehouse to see us through the great economic depression of the 1930s and the great war of the 1940s. Ronald Reagan rescued the nation’s psyche, and restored that nation to its rightful place of preeminence. Lincoln said,

“When the conduct of men is designed to be influenced, persuasion, kind unassuming persuasion, should ever be adopted. It is an old and true maxim that 'a drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.' So with men. If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart, which, say what he will, is the great highroad to his reason, and which, once gained, you will find but little trouble in convincing him of the justice of your cause, if indeed that cause is really a good one.”

George W. Bush was faced with a disastrous attack on this nation by the evil purveyors of terrorism. Since then, he has guided the nation through the liberation of Afghanistan, the acquiescence of former terrorist state Libya, and the liberation of Iraq. During his administration the settlement of the Palestinian question has moved closer to peaceful resolution than it has ever been. He has faced down natural disasters from forest fires to the horrible hurricane season that will not die. He has faced economic crises, yet our economy today is healthier, and stronger than it has been in decades.

Through it all, President Bush, and his wonderful First Lady Laura, have remained upbeat, confident, and focused. He is as determined to defeat terrorism today as he was on September 11, 2001.

Yet these braying jackasses call him a liar. They call him weak. They call him ineffective and ineffectual. They (most of them) stop just short of accusing him of committing a crime over the start of the Iraq war. They take his words out of context and slam him by making those words mean something else.

They do this not because any of it is true – it isn’t, not a word of it. They do it because they have nothing of their own to offer the nation. They are fresh out of ideas. Their desperation has forced them from the dignified, respectful role of loyal opposition, into a carping, braying collection of weak-kneed politicians with nothing to offer.

I have no pity for them, I have no respect for them, only scorn that in their weakness, they can offer no solutions, no ideas, no ideals to which to cling, only callous and venomous attacks.

When I begin to hear alternatives, ideas, and such, that are legitimate, and not the same rhetoric of divisiveness that their party created in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when they come forward with a realistic alternative to the current set of policies, and that alternative reserves and preserves the nation’s honor, and restores respect to national politics once again, I will listen. I may not agree, but I will listen. When I note Denny Democrat has once again embraced the good sense embodied in Lincoln’s quote above, I will listen again. Until then, I will continue to tune out the lies.

THE CENTRIST

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. " Albert Einstein

Copyright © 2005, "THE CENTRIST" . All Rights Reserved.

Welcome to THE CENTRIST

We are getting things ready for our debut on Wednesday, November 30, 2005. We plan to introduce a blog that discusses Pennsylvania and National politics, and political people.

While we are essentially conservatives, we do believe we are middle of the road, or centered politically, probably close to the center stripe in our web address. Nevertheless, this IS a conservative blog, and we will likely have much to say about the Democrats that will disturb any liberal/progressive readers. On the hther hand, we are not going to be complete cheerleaders for the Republican Party, either. Indeed, in Pennsylvania at least, the Republicans have much to answer for and we intend to keep the heat on. We will call them as we see them. We will not apologize for that. We will stand by what we write, as it is opinion. If we discover that our opinion is ill-informed opinion, we are not above writing retractions. If we have presented facts we will at least document where we obtained verification of those facts. Finally, we may from time to time, receive information from confidential sources. In such cases, we will identify it as such.

To quote the late, great Bette Davis, in her film All About Eve, "Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy night!"

Here is our official address: http://centristatheart.blogspot.com

Please bookmark/save to favorites. Stop back often. The political season for 2006 will be on us shortly.

Thanks!

THE CENTRIST

"It is the duty of every citizen according to his best capacities to give validity to his convictions in political affairs. " Albert Einstein

Copyright © 2005, "THE CENTRIST" . All Rights Reserved.