What a sad sad situation in Pennsylvania. Alot of 'buyers remorse' there with Corbett

[LynneSin]

I was visiting family this weekend so I had a chance to read the local newspaper including the Sunday paper (Harrisburg Patriot News). What I saw saddened me and how a Governor can make such dumbass decisions will baffle the best of us.

Sitting underneath layers and layers and layers of Pennsylvania land seems to be alot of Natural Gas. Unfortunately it's so deep that I guess this Fracking is the only way to get the stuff out of there. Thanks to the election of Tom Corbett as governor, these oil companies are pretty much given free reign to destroy the Pennsylvania landscape and make a shitload of money extracting this gas.

Then we have the children of Pennsylvania. Yes the school budget has always been tight in PA, but the horrible budget cuts that Corbett wants to pass takes serious cuts not only to the public schools but to the financial aid & scholarships available for these kids. As someone who grew up in Pennsylvania, the state university system (14 colleges smaller colleges along with Penn State and a few others) was a way for a kid to get an education without killing their bank account but even these schools will have less money available to help deserving kids attend college.

As I read these 2 articles it just made me even more angry.

I don't know if we can stop the drilling/fracking for the natural gas in Pennsylvania but for right now, let's just assume it is going to happen. There is millions of dollars of natural gas down there and it's not like this gas can be outsourced to other countries or relocated to another state where they have more lax drilling laws. It's there and personally my 2 cents is this - if you want it you'll have to abide by these regulations and pay these taxes else we'll just leave it there for now. And trust me, if some gas company really wants it they'll be happy to follow these steps knowing they'll still make good money.

But instead Corbett, who received oodles of campaign cash from these oil companies, doesn't want to increase taxes on them. Worried we'll piss them off and they'll send the jobs elsewhere. WHAT????!!!!! How can you send jobs to drill for natural gas in the state of Pennsylvania to somewhere else??

What really pisses me off is Corbett could easy meet his budget goals without compromising education by one very simple way - put a tax on the natural gas these people want to drill.

I have a nephew who wanted to be a teacher - talked about it for years and started his freshman year in college. After seeing the stress of what PA teachers are going thru he changed majors. Sad, he would have made a great teacher too (wanted to teach History).

How did they allow Tom Corbett to get elected is beyond me.

[badhair77]

1. Good summation, LynneSin

In my opinion there is nothing good to be said about Tom Corbett and his policies. It seems he cares little about the state, the people, its natural resources, or its children. He's all about making the natural gas companies comfortable and naming energy people to oversight positions as a thank you.

According to The Phila Daily News (3/8.11) "2010 gubernatorial candidate Corbett received a whopping $835,720 from oil-and-natural gas interests, including his largest single contributor - Marcellus Shale driller Terry Pegula and his wife Kim, who gave $305,000 to the Republican's campaign at the same time Pegula was selling his exploration firm to Royal Dutch Shell and pocketing a $3 billion check. Indeed, Corbett's career in elective Pennsylvania politics was launched in 2004 when an Oklahoma gas driller - Aubrey McClendon of Chesapeake Energy - funneled most of the dollars for an eye-popping $480,000 donation that went to Corbett's attorney general campaign from an obscure GOP fund."

Nothing good to be said about him unless you donated to one of his campaigns first.

[bullwinkle428]

2. ExxonMobil is sure spending the big bucks these days telling us

how wonderful and safe fracking is. I'm sure Corbett's nest is very well-feathered by that filthy oil money!

[femmocrat]

3. Check out the Pennsylvania Forum for lots of good information on Corbett's budget and Marcellus

shale drilling. We have several members who follow these issues and post regularly.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=175

[badhair77]

4. Thanks femmocrat

[RamboLiberal]

5. He is even being trashed quite often on KDKA radio in Pittsburgh

Which is/was a somewhat RW station. But Marty Griffin morning and Robert Mangino evening have been regularly ripping him over dropping Adult Basic, refusing to tax Marcellus Shale, asking state workers to take a 4% cut yet donating his COLA to charity instead of cutting his salary and not asking lawmakers to cut their pay and perks. I even heard Mike "Pinhead" Pintek ripping him over not wanting a Marcellus tax. Mangino has been calling him King Corbett.

Hearing a lot of their ditto head callers also regretting they voted for him.

This is damn rare for weekday hosts on that station to be ripping a Repub gov.

[LynneSin]

6. There was even 2 LTTE from folks who regretted voting Corbett

One guy said he was a vowed conservative but it makes no sense to not tax Marcellus Shale when so many others are being asked to make sacrifice including to Pennsylvania children.

[Bravo Zulu]

7. Short term profits,long term damage!

http://shale.sites.post-gazette.com/index.php/multimedia/interactives/interactive-timeline

[disillusioned73]

8. PA follows the national trend of willful ignorance when it comes to

politics/politicians. Party loyalty trumped sane policies and a dispirited left didn't help - we are in trouble. My wife works in education, and her school announced major lay-offs last week. Good teachers lost..this is by design though, there has been a systematic degredation of our school system for some time. Privatization is on the horizon.

[JPZenger]

9. There's much more discussion on this topic over on the PA. forum of DU

Click Places and then Pennsylvania for much more discussion on this topic.