News, Entertainment, Enlightenment
Fred Cherry, an Air Force fighter pilot, who spent more than seven years as a POW in North Vietnam after being shot down in 1965 died Feb. 16.
He was 87.
An excellent obituary which details his courage and dignity can be found at Stars and Stripes here.
A hippopotamus is more closely related to a whale than an elephant.
But they are lousy swimmers.
Val DiGiorgio Replacing Gleason? — A little birdie told us that Chester County Republican Chairman Val DiGiorgio has the inside track to replace Rob Gleason as chairman of the Pennsylvania Republican Party.
Former Congresswoman Melissa Hart, who has quite a bit of influence in state-wide GOP circles, was reportedly boosting him big at the Feb. 15 Spirit of Lincoln Dinner hosted by the Allegheny County Republican Party out there in Pittsburgh.
If our birdie is accurate, we betcha Montco Dem boss Josh Shapiro is quietly cheering.
Stan Casacio Gets 1500 Signatures — The petitions for Montgomery County businessman Stan Casacio were accepted, Feb. 16, by the Pennsylvania Department of State and he will be on the ballot, April 26, for the Republican 7th congressional primary.
He is challenging incumbent Pat Meehan.
Over 1500 names were collected.
Casacio is running because of concerns about fiscal irresponsibility and uncontrolled immigration among other things. While he still faces an uphill battle, Meehan better take him seriously considering what happened in South Carolina on Saturday.
Count Feodor Ivanovich Tolstoy — cousin to the great author Leo — got himself a berth on the sloop Nadezhda on the First Russian Circumnavigation in 1803.
The event’s purpose was to bring prestige to the nation and advance scientific knowledge.
Tolstoy was royalty so he didn’t have an assigned role. He spent his time drinking, picking fights and playing jokes. He got the ship’s priest drunk, for instance, then glued his beard to the deck.
The final straw, though, was likely the orangutan.
During an island stop, he acquired a pet orangutan. He snuck it into the captain’s cabin, took out the logbook, put a blank sheet of paper on top and showed the ape how to cover it with ink. He left while ape went on drawing. When the captain returned, the records were ruined along with much scientific data.
Enough became enough and Tolstoy and the orangutan was marooned by the crew on the Kamchatka peninsula. From there Tolstoy made it to Aleutian islands and from there to Siberia and home.
He became known as The American due to his stay in Alaska. Nobody knows what happened to the orangutan.
Chesco Inquisition Closed? Not So Fast — Long-time Republican and Phoenixville election worker Paul Celentano missed the note that the Chester County Republican Party inquisition scheduled for Feb. 11 at party HQ on Church Street in West Chester so he went.
He was met by the county GOP Executive Director Laura Wagoner who explained that the event was cancelled but he couldn’t have attended anyway as it would have been a closed hearing. 
The hearing is suspected to have been an attempt to remove committeepeople ane Ladley, Tom Ferro, Steve Mobley and Donna Ellingsen who are accused of violating party bylaws for supporting candidates other than the nominated ones.
Mrs. Ladley is the Area 19 chairwoman.
Mrs. Ellingsen says that those accused have not consented to a closed hearing.
“We have specifically informed the Chesco GOP solicitor that we have nothing to hide behind closed doors,” she said.
Lotte Lenya named in the American version of “Mack the Knife” was the wife of composer Kurt Weill who co-wrote The Threepenny Opera from which the song comes. Lotte is also known for playing the evil Rosa Klebb in the James Bond movie From Russia With Love. Suky Tawdry, Lucy Brown et al were characters in the play.
Pat Toomey Stay Strong — Sen. Pat Toomey, who has been a very good senator for Pennsylvania and the nation, has gone on record saying the replacement for recently deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia must be appointed by the next president.
He is right.
There are troubling reports that the U.S. Senate’s Republican majority which is not known for its profile in courage will listen to the whispers of the Washington game players and allow Obama to name another Bill Ayers disciple.
Any choice by Obama, it should be noted, will be a Bill Ayers disciple.
If you want to continue to protect the lives of little girls, Sen. Toomey, make sure you fight these whisperers and make sure the Scalia seat stays vacant until next January.
Many people who voted for you in 2010 did so with for the sole reason that would you be in a position to stop Obama on a matter such as this. If you abandon them they will certainly abandon you this fall.
A giraffe’s tongue is 20 inches long. Yes Anthony, that means they can clean their own ear with it.
Money Floats Around In Pa — By Leo Knepper
A couple of weeks ago, Sen. Scott Wagner pointed out the $129 million “Swiss Bank Account” operated by the Pittsburgh Public Schools. The massive cash reserve was brought to light by a report from the Auditor General just in time to avoid an unnecessary tax increase. It is reasonable and prudent for school districts to maintain a rainy day fund. However, Pennsylvania school districts are ready for a biblical flood. They have a combined $4 billion in reserves socked away, but that doesn’t prevent them from crying poverty at every opportunity.
There are other, more disturbing, examples of off the books pools of money that came to light during the budget “crisis”. Even in the absence of a budget, Governor Wolf managed to spend over $30 billion. This spending got the attention of several Representatives last year and what they found was eye-opening. One of the accounting tricks employed by the Governor was the use of waivers:
“Their digging uncovered that $2.7 billion in waivers, which is money left over from previous budget years, had been spent in the four months after the 2014-15 fiscal year ended at the end of June.”
As we enter another budget season, Representatives and Senators need to determine how much more money is floating around off the books. Money left over from previous budgets does not belong to government agencies, it belongs to the taxpayers. Having an accurate assessment of the amount of unspent, previously allocated funds could save taxpayers billions of dollars going forward and plug that “structural deficit” the Governor keeps mentioning.
Mr. Knepper is executive director of Citizens Alliance of Pennsylvania.