Rather than resurrect old threads by Airman Doors and myself, let’s say this is a continuation of them. Voters are still pissed over the obscene pay raises conferred on the legislature by themselves at 0200, yet papers in the Philly area no longer consider it to be a hot topic. Perhaps those voters are accustomed to being fucked by elected officials so often that they can roll over and take it in their sleep.
The service counters of electrical, plumbing and mechanical supply outfits out here all have sign-up sheets of support to reject the recent pay raise, perhaps because we’re foolish blue-collar slobs who don’t deserve a raise greater than most folks see in a decade.
When the hard-working boys and girls come back to Harrisburg on the 26th of September, a rally is planned to greet them. Check out Pat Carroll’s column in the Patriot-News for further information and links.
If this issue is allowed to slip from the front page of public consciousness, they will will have ridden out the storm. I don’t plan to forget.
Thanks for the information. As another member of the lunatic card carrying middle, I plan to be there.
Ahh… we’re in the Pit. Bunch of freaking assholes… what the hell were they thinking when they gave themselves that kind of raise??
They were thinking, “We can do anything and STILL get re-elected! It’s like printing your own money! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!”
Which is, of course, the great weakness of modern democracy. Even those who bother to show up at the polls and push the lever generally do so on automatic pilot.
I’ll be there if I can get leave. I’d also like to refer you to Operation Clean Sweep, a movement to vote out every single incumbent. I know I’m dreaming, but if we can keep this in the public consciousness we may be able to get a few of them out on the street.
Quite the opposite. We expect the occasional corruption scandal (this year, it was the city treasurer). But, in general the city government is full of people with principles who work hard.
Next election, I plan to continue my history of voting against Mike Stack. I’ve met the man. He is lying slime. He did vote against the pay raise. Then, he took the money anyway.
My wife and I will be there. We’re not terribly politically motivated, but the outandout greed is astonishing.
I especially enjoyed how they called the raise something like unvouchered expense payments to get around the ban on immediate pay raises in the state constitution.
Then they throw a bribe at the judges (in the form of a huge pay raise) to keep them from declaring the raise unconstitutional.
I swear, this state under Rendell has been one clusterfuck after another. He cuts library funding. He wants to close the state hospital and throws the patients onto the counties and local bodies. He gets slot machines in and gets school boards to reject the funding from the machines by attaching restrictions to the money that state lawmakers wouldn’t stand for (thereby keeping the money for the state and not lowering property taxes).
Boost spending, cut social services, increase taxes. Who does he think he is, a Republican?
Here’s a relatively non-biased news article about the raise. The raise was from 16 to 34%, depending on position. The minimum any legislator will make is a little over $81,000. The law also ties state legislators’ raises to Congressional pay raises. Their pension, transportation, and per diems were also increased.
It’s not only the size of the raise that’s at issue. The legislature enacted it in the middle of the night, literally. Constitutionally, the increase can’t take place until after the next election, in 2006, but they took advantage of a loophole, in that the raise will be considered an “unvouchered expense” and thus payable now.
This is the mental quality of what we’ve got in our legislature:
Um, Rep. Perzel, if you know August is a slow news month, then why did you do something like this now? Did you honestly think the Pennsylvania press wasn’t going to pick up on this? And do you think you can backpedal your way out of this mess?
At issue here is the size of the pay raise, the way they voted on it in the middle of the night with no debate, the general dissatisfaction with their performance in the past few years that does not justify the pay raise, and the fact that it is absolutely unconstitutional but because it included the judicial branch they created a conflict of interest such that the courts will be forced to deny themselves pay raises if they strike it down. In fact, the Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court, Judge Ralph Cappy, has gone on record about the pay raise, to wit:
We now have the highest compensated legislature in the country once aides and staff are factored in. There is no justification for this, not after the Act 72 debacle of the past year or the tax increases that Rendell and the Congess has forced through. It’s ridiculous, and yet the legislators feel entitled to give themselves an unconstitutional pay rasie to boot.
I have a real problem with that. The whole state has a problem with that. We need to keep this alive for the next 18 months until the elections roll around. They calculated that people would forget, hence the attempt to circumvent the Constitution with the mid-term “unvouchered expenses”. I don’t want people to forget. I want the people to send these clowns packing. Hell, I’ll run if they can’t find somebody else. Anything to get rid of these putzes.
Well, now, folks, our congress-critters are feeling a bit short on support. It seems since the pay raised was passed that our Speaker of the House, John Perzel, has been out of town. To be precise, he’s been in China, on “a tropical island getaway”, and in Italy, or will be. The first one is state business, intended to boost trade; the second two trips are just personal vacations.
I’ve nothing against personal vacations, to the tropics, Europe, or anywhere else. I lived in Hawaii for several years, I still have friends there, and I’d love to go back. I was born in England, and I’d love to go back and visit my relatives. Why don’t I? Because I can’t afford to. Unlike our representatives, I don’t make anywhere near their salaries and I can’t vote myself a pay raise.
By the way, Perzel does have plans for when he gets back to work. Like his Democratic counterpart (Perzel is a Republican), he plans on demoting those who voted against the pay raise. He’s also saying, through a spokesman, it’s not his job to defend colleagues after tough votes. Nope, just penalize them for doing the right thing.
Philly Dopers, he’s yours! Have fun with him. Me, I’ve got some on my end of the state. :rolleyes:
