Day: January 19, 2010

God Bless Rendell (for a change)

Ed Rendell has not been the most competent governor to lead our state but God bless him for the effort he put out to rescue those 54 orphans from Haiti and for persevering through the garbage thrown at him to get the job done.

Here’s a story about what the mission had to go through before a successful end.

Benefield’s Excellent Plan For Not Tolling I-80

The Big-Spenders-With-Our-Ransacked-Money (BSWORMs) who now run Pennsylvania are still scheming for  toll booths on I-80.

Nathan Benefield of the Commonwealth Foundation has come up with a list of alternatives  for finding the desperately needed dollars that the BSWORMs say must come from new government-caused traffic snarls.

Benefield’s suggestions are:

  • Repeal prevailing wage laws which mandate wages for government projects 40 percent higher, on average, than the private sector pays for the same work; and would free up hundred of millions, if not billions, for highway construction and repair.

  • Stop redirecting highway and bridge money to other purposes. 
  • Enable public-private partnerships, especially for new construction like express lanes, high occupancy lanes, new highways, new bridges etc.
  • Eliminate the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) –rolling the Turnpike Commission into PennDOT, would eliminate an unnecessary bureaucracy and offer substantial saving in transportation spending.

  • Privatize rest stops.




Excellent ideas all; and I would also point out that forbidding all government workers from striking — which would include SEPTA employees and public school teachers — would free up a lot of state money for highway projects since the state would not have to subsidize public schools and transportation to the degree it now does.

I would also point out that making the Pennsylvania Turnpike a freeway and replacing the revenue by hiking the gasoline tax (or by spending less) would be a net tax cut since we would no longer have to pay the people to snarl the traffic.

Planned Parenthood ‘Supercenter’ To Be In A Black Neighborhood

Planned Parenthood is preparing to open a “supercenter” this spring in Houston. It will be six stories and 78,000 square feet and have a “surgical wing” for abortions.

It will be in a Black and Hispanic neighborhood.

Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, believed the country would be better off with fewer Blacks (and Italians, and Slavs and Jews for that matter).

Today, Blacks, who make up about 13. 5 percent of the population, have 36 percent of abortions.

 Planned Parenthood ‘Supercenter’ To Be In A Black Neighborhood