As I mentioned yesterday, the Jon Geeting Media Empire is expanding to include a presence at the resurgent Keystone Politics. The plan is to aim for 1-2 unique posts at KP every day on state politics, two Patch columns a week on political economy/metro policy topics, regular blogging here on whatever I damn well please, aggregated at the LVIM hive mind.
I may eventually have this blog redirect to a new Jon Geeting blog since I’ve been super lazy about recruiting contributors to replace Ryan and Hillary. Jeff Pooley has been receptive to the idea of blogging here, so I will hold off on any name change for a little while.
Anyway, here’s my opening salvo at Keystone Politics laying out the political case for Democrats to let Republicans kill the Scarnati local impact fees bill:
Now that taxmaster Grover Norquist has decided to score a local impact fee as a tax increase, probably nothing is going to happen without a significant number of Democratic votes.So the Democrats can maximize their political advantage by voting ”present” and letting the Republicans own the failure. Democrats don’t have control of any of the branches of government in Harrisburg, so they won’t be blamed when the bill goes down.
Inevitably, there will be more gas well explosions and blockbuster news stories about contaminated water before the 2012 elections. The voters already agree with the Democrats, so Democrats can improve their political position in 2012 by making hay of these bad news stories, and forcing Republicans to pick sides between Tom Corbett and the concerned public.
Jon, even a casual reading of Scarnati's bill shows it will do absolutely nothing for the environment. There is no sinking fund requirement, and funds generated can be spent on pretty much anything. So when funds are needed for cleanup, there will be an empty account and then current taxpayers will take it in the shorts.
So in short this is a tax, you are correct, and it should be defeated.
And I do enjoy your recommendation that the Democrats employ the strategy outlined in your post about "The Myth of the Rational Voter."
Your righteous indignation in that post is surpassed only by your hypocrisy here.
By the way, you sure are doing alot of blogging, articles, etc.
Since you are "Independent" I'm sure you accept no money or other economic gain of any nature whatsoever for any of this activity.
After all, your ethics and morals, strong as they are, would never allow you to be a paid partisan hack while hiding the source and acting as an "Independent."
And of course, if you were being paid, your ethics and morals are so strong that you would disclose this so the reader knows you really aren't "Independent."
Right?
I agree, the Scarnati bill has no redeeming value. It shouldn't be viewed as a "next best" option for a severance tax, and that's why it's not worth it for the Democrats to help pass it.
That's a pretty lame argument regarding political tactics. Politics is what it is. I'd prefer a parliamentary system with fewer veto points and "bipartisanship by alternation". But seeing as we have the system we have, I'm not suggesting anyone unilaterally disarm. People should be trying to get their policy priorities accomplished by following the rules to the letter, but they should also be trying to reform the rules.
I get paid for my Patch columns. The other blogging is a hobby. Believe me, I would love to be getting paid for this, but sadly I'm actually just this neurotic.
I've created a monster!