Delaware County GOP boss Andy Reilly sounded a bit flustered on Dom Giordano, today, Aug. 3.
The posting by AS Hallinan was made May 28 at 6:03 p.m. and reads Mr. Paul A. Mullen has been endorsed to represent the 161st District in the PA House of Representatives. — at Heritage Ballrooms. The meeting didn’t start until 7 p.m.
He said a report that an email saying Mullen’s candidacy was announced an hour before the nomination meeting is ludicrous.
Of course it is. It was a Facebook posting.
He said “I take issue with people saying that just because someone is a member of a trade union he is liberal.”
Lisa Esler appeared on the Chris Stigall 6:15 a.m., this morning, Aug. 3.
She will be on Dom Giordano at 10 a.m. Dom has just said Paul Mullen should not be in office and if the official Democrat should win it wouldn’t make a difference.
From left, Leanne Krueger-Braneky, moderator Philip Hodgson, Lisa Esler and an empty seat for Paul Mullen.
Two women gave honest presentations before a standing room crowd of at least 60 this afternoon, Aug. 2, as to where they stood on the issues facing Pennsylvania, while the endorsed Republican hid like, well, a little girl.
The forum sponsored by Delco Debates was held in the Swarthmore council meeting hall and concerned Tuesday’s special election for the vacant 161st District State House seat.
The participants were Democrat Leanne Krueger-Braneky and write-in Republican Lisa Esler. A empty chair was placed for Paul Mullen, the county AFL-CIO president who was tapped by the GOP. Several invitations were sent to Mullen who never responded.
Mrs. Krueger-Braneky of Swarthmore, described herself as business consultant, a mother of a three year old and a person of faith. She said she supported legalization of medical marijuana, a taxpayer bailout of the state’s pension funds, and a severance tax on natural gas drillers.
She also said she supported Gov. Wolf’s proposed tax plans and more money for education.
She said Pennsylvania had the most unequal funding for schools in the nation.
“I want good schools,” she said. “I want good schools for kids in Philadelphia. I want good schools for kids in Chester.
She said she opposed the sale of Pennsylvania’s publicly owned liquor stores, as they make money for the state.
She said that during holidays, people from Delaware and New Jersey sometimes shop for liquor in Pennsylvania due to that state-regulated pricing.
That claim drew murmurs of skepticism from the crowd.
She said she opposed school vouchers and a 401K-type plan for state workers.
She said she supported adding pre-school education.
Mrs. Esler, of Aston, who has described herself as a wife, mother, grandmother, certified optician, and Penn Delco school board director, and who makes her driver listen to K-LOVE, said she opposed a severance tax on natural gas drillers as long as the state’s corporate tax was 9.9 percent as she feared driving them out. She noted she would reconsider if the state were to cut the corporate tax to the rates of states that charge a high severance tax.
She said she supported privatizing the state stores.
She said she supported school vouchers.
“I don’t think any child should go to school in fear of his life,” she said. “I’m more concerned about the child than the government (agency).”
She noted that the pension crisis was drastically driving up property taxes and supported moving state workers and legislators to a 401-K type plan as most private businesses have. She pledged not to take a pension if elected.
She said she had not thought much about medical marijuana before entering the race in June and has heard pros and cons during her campaigning. She promised to keep an open mind.
In a question regarding more funding for public transportation, Mrs. Krueger-Braneky praised the gasoline tax increase passed by the legislature in 2013 and said she supported more funding for SEPTA while Mrs. Esler did the opposite. Mrs. Krueger-Braneky said public transportation was good for the environment while Mrs. Esler noted that people who have to use their cars are already hurting.
Neither candidate was familiar with a plan to have sewer treatment plants handle fracking and mine waste but both thought the idea was pretty disgusting.
In a question concerning the state’s policy of life without parole for certain crimes, Mrs. Esler thought those who committed heinous murders deserved it while Mrs. Krueger-Braneky was open to the idea of reform.
With regard to easing the state’s recently found-to-be unconstitutional rules for minor party ballot access, Mrs. Krueger-Braneky appeared to feel they shouldn’t be eased much while Mrs. Esler thought they should be.
“The two-party system is broken,” she said.
Both candidates express dislike for the property tax. Mrs. Krueger-Braneky supported the reforms proposed by Gov. Wolf. Mrs. Esler said she supported eliminating it but expressed concerns about existing legislation as it would punish school districts that had been fiscally responsible while rewarding those otherwise.
Mrs. Esler said spending reforms were the best solution. She noted that simply ending the prevailing wage mandate would have saved the Penn Delco School District $8 million in recent construction costs.
Mrs. Krueger-Braneky supported more education spending. Mrs. Esler noted that in the last 14 years, the state’s student population has dropped by 35,000 while school employees have increased by the same number.
Mrs. Esler said waste was rampant in Harrisburg. She said there was $2.2 billion in unemployment fraud during the last four years and between $2 billion and $4 billion in welfare fraud.
In a response to a question regarding the repeal of the “temporary” Johnstown Food tax of 1936 that to this day adds 18 percent to the sale of booze in Pennsylvania, Mrs. Esler pointed out that the taxes being sought by Gov. Wolf would be “temporary” in the same way while the property tax relief would soon end.
Regarding Mullen who was hiding, it was twice noted during the course of the forum that he actually ran away from questioners during his door to door campaigning.
Lisa Esler, the Republican write-in candidate, for the vacant 161st District Pennsylvania House Seat, will be appearing on the The Behind The Mike Show internet radio program, 8 p.m., tomorrow, Aug. 2.
She and Leanne Krueger-Braneky, the official Democrat, will be appearing at a forum 2 to 4 tomorrow afternoon at Swarthmore Borough Hall, 121 Park Ave sponsored by Delco Debates.
The official government-party candidate, Paul Mullen, a union official endorsed by the GOP this time but until a fews ago had been supporting hard-left Democrats, has pointedly ducked all debates.
Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor was the first women to sit as a Member of Parliament in the British House of Commons. She was an American. She famously told Winston Churchill that she would give him poison if he was her husband. Churchill famously responded that if he was her husband he would drink it. Churchill was half American.
Lady Astor’s first husband was Robert Gould Shaw II who was the cousin of Col. Robert Gould Shaw who was played by Matthew Broderick in the 1989 Oscar winning movie Glory. She divorced him but she never poisoned him.
A decade or so ago, America was getting half it’s energy from coal. While it is still the largest source it has now fallen to 37 percent, as of 2012, with natural gas rising to 30 percent and climbing.
Fracking opponents say it releases methane which is worse for the atmosphere than CO2. The recent wells, however, are seriously mitigating the problem.
For those that want to stop fracking to return to coal, watch this video. Did you know that coal seam fires alone are thought to account for 3 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases?
Gov. Tom Wolf will lead a rally for Leanne Krueger-Braneky, 10:30 a.m. tomorrow, Aug. 1, at the Swarthmore train station at Chester Road and Park Avenue.
Ms. Krueger-Braneky is the official Democrat in the special election for the vacant 161st District Pennsylvania State House seat.
The Republican-endorsed Democrat is Paul Mullen who gets a $130,000 salary as business manager of Local 654 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and by all accounts intends to keep it even if he should win the election..
Until a just a few short weeks ago Mullen had been campaigning hard for Democrats as liberal as Ms. Krueger-Braneky. In fact, if I lived in the district, I’d seriously consider voting for her. OK, I’d write in Mickey Mouse but, really, I would rather have her in the legislature than Mullen. She’d be far less of an obstacle to advancing the cause of the necessary reforms to keep the taxpayers from being crushed by the corruption, especially the legal corruption, rampant in our capital city.
Lisa Esler
Fortunately, in this round I would not have to vote for the naive leftist or write in Mickey.
There is an honest person who cares about homeowner, the parent and the elderly person on a fixed income.
Her name is Lisa Esler and she has launched a write-in campaign that has a fair shot at winning.
Spaniard Joan Pujol Garcia received a special Iron Cross from Adolph Hitler and an knighthood from King George VI for his World War II service. He was an almost unbelievably effective allied spy who pretended really well to be working for the Nazis.
The last blue moon was in August 2012. The next one will be in January 2018.
The moon has at times actually turned blue, it should be noted. This usually happens after a major volcanic eruption with the ash filtering the light reflected from the orb.
And the meaning of “blue moon” has changed slightly from when it came into use. It originally meant the third full moon in a season that had four, understanding that seasons are considered to be three months long and hence typically have but three full moons.
For even good neighbors, the answer of course is “no,” and that’s OK, because compromising over differences of opinion is the essence not only of civility in general but also the public policy process in particular.
In that spirit, I am calling on Gov. Wolf to live as a better neighbor with the state legislature and sign the approved state budget into law. The legislature-approved budget matches the governor’s original proposal with equal or better funding for 270 of the 401 (67%) line items that make up the budget. This legislature-approved budget is fair, reasonable and responsible on behalf of the 12.7 million citizens of our great Commonwealth.
Instead, Gov. Wolf opted to veto the major and historic pieces of legislation passed by the legislature in June. Worse, since then, this governor has refused compromise with the legislature, thereby rendering state government reeling on the verge of shutdown as we slide through August.
In this case, the governor is in the wrong simply to veto all this legislation across-the-board, because it all is not exactly as he, but one person, wants. No bill is the proverbial “perfect,” and all of you as one individual citizen probably would make a change in some respect if given the option. Nonetheless, at some point decisions must be made, and the policy and political reality is one of legislation that has been crafted deliberatively after much consideration and debate in Harrisburg.
The legislature-approved budget:
• Caps at $30.18 billion, and checks the growth rate (from last year’s budget) below that of inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
• Remains balanced and rejects reckless borrowing and government debt.
• Turns down Tom Wolf’s proposed tax increase, the largest ever for Pennsylvania, including an unprecedented expansion of the sales tax as well as pushing up the personal income tax; voted down unanimously, Democrats and Republicans alike, by the House.
• Unmasks the governor’s property tax reduction claim as a phantom.
It also invests in education as it:
• Allocates $11 billion to education, the highest amount ever in Pennsylvania state education dollars.
• Equates to nearly 45% of spending being devoted to education (to include primary, secondary and higher education, as well as number of “small” slices not separately broken out on budget pie graph.
• Positions Pennsylvania’s per student spending at $15,535, considered well above the national average of $11,764, according even to the union: the National Education Association.
This ;budget was assed by the legislature on June 30 and vetoed by Gov. Wolf July 1
The status of Pennsylvania’s state owned liquor stores was addressed with House Bill 466 which
• Approves reform by both House and Senate for first time since end of Prohibition.
• Recognizes that running adult beverage sector fails definition of limited government.
• Allows ample opportunity for private sector markets to offer these products.
• Permits as well the direct shipment of wine, something long wanted by citizens.
• Creates better convenience, choice and cost for consumers.
This bill was passed by the legislature June 29 and vetoed by Gov. Wolf July 2
The necessary pension reform was addressed with Senate Bill 1 which
• Leverages $10 billion in savings for the taxpayers, and leads to new fiscal paths to prevent future pension crises.
• Acknowledges that current employees and retirees have paid their pension contributions.
• Applies bill provisions to new employees: enrolled into defined contribution/401-style plans rather than defined benefit plans.
• Legislators, including even current ones if re-elected (thereby becoming “new” state employees), and their staffs also no longer would be entitled to defined benefit plans.
• Plan demonstrates determination to demand fiscal prudence in fairness to the future of our kids and grandkids.
This was passed by the legislature June 30 and vetoed by Gov. Wolf July 9.
While all of us strongly hold our points of view, no one can reasonably expect to get one’s own way completely in life, let alone politics. Policy outcomes on behalf of the citizens must somehow balance the extraordinary array of interests and opinions in our large and politically diverse state. In the final analysis, what is called for is agreement on one budget, one set of laws, and one path forward that permits our one state government to serve the millions of citizens whom comprise Pennsylvania.
Tell Governor Wolf it’s time to reach across the backyard fence and compromise: Call him at 717-787-2500 or email him here.
Rep. Milne represents the 167th Legislative District in the Pennsylvania House. He is a professor of Political Science at West Chester University and has written academic papers on federalism and public sector management.[5] He also has worked as an organizational consultant and has gained international experience through business projects in countries throughout Asia, including China, Japan, South Korea and the Philippines.
