philly

PA Senate Debate: Lancaster 5

The issue of lobbyist/special interest money came up on several occassions within the context of several questions, but mainly in the sixth question which addressed earmarking of bills and lobbying money. Bob said that the system is broken and that things being earmarked in larger bills [I think this is also called "paperclipping"] deserve the same light of day as the full bill itself. He said that "sunshine is the best disinfectant" and I actually agree with him on that [stop the presses, what time is it?] Unfortunately, he has no problem with taking special interest money and doesn't seem to think that taking money from the same donors as Man on Dog is a problem. Alan is opposed to overnight earmarks and brought up last year's PA pay raise scandal which happened, duh, overnight. He called out Bob for signing all of those checks [he's the PA Treasurer] which were all unconstitutional. Alan stated that he is against lobbyist money, but accepts money from some PACs, but does not have a specific calculus as to which he'd accept money from and which he would turn down money from. Chuck is the only PAC free and special interest money free candidate in the race and agreed with Alan that Bob the illegal pay raises were bad for all Pennsylvanians. He called out Alan for selling out his position on the issue of parental notification/consent to special interests. In an August interview with PoliticsPhilly.com, Alan stated that he was for limited parental notification and consent.

The ninth question addressed the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and whether or not we should withdraw immidately in accordance with the plan Rep. John Murtha (PA-12) put forth and the tenth question asked who were the most serious nuclear threats in the world. Bob said he was against immediate withdrawal and blamed BushCo for lying to get into the war and Man on Dog for being all frothy at the mouth over the war. Bob would have voted for the war with the information at the time and now feels that we need to finish the job since we're there. He called for an independent senator with no ties to big oil to lead; none of the candidates take money from big oil. Bob stated that the US government must leave all options on the table with Iran and North Korea, the two most dangerous nuclear threats. He said that there should be negotiations first, but that the military and The Bomb should still be used as leverage in the end, as BushCo currently feels. Alan favors the Murtha plan and adds that it does not call for an immidate withdrawal as in tomorrow the troops come home, but over a matter of months [I think he said six to nine months]. He said that by the end of 2006, the US troops should be limited to border patrol and redeployment in hot spots. He echoed the Bush categorization of North Korea and Iran as charter members of the Axis of Evil and that coalitions are needed to talk to them as the US cannot do it alone.

Chuck started off by asking his fellow candidates to call for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to a round of applause from the crowd. It was at this point [about seventy-five minutes into the debate] that a Casey supporter [he had on a sticker] behind me said to the person sitting next to him "[Chuck] is making all the right points" to which I grinned. Chuck also agrees with the Murtha plan; he's been calling for a withdrawal since June of 2005. Chuck also favors redeployment in hot spots. Chuck also listed North Korea and Iran as the most dangerous nuclear threats, but stressed that threats of nuclear force is not the way to go. He called for the US to embrace a nuclear non-proliferation treaty and lead by example. He called North Korea the source of the world's loose nukes and stressed that a dialogue must be opened up with Iran as they are currently years away from developing nuclear bomb making capabilities [a Right wing lie!].

The twelfth and final question asked the candidates why they would make a better senator than Man on Dog. Bob listed the 181K jobs lost in PA since 2001 and the 17K who lost health insurance since 2001 [but Bob's expanded healthcare plan addresses child healthcare coverage and not universal coverage as Chuck and Alan espouse and recently the CEO of GlaxsoSmithKline endorsed and called financially feasable]. Alan started off by saying that living in the state of PA would be a start. He cited ties to lobbyist money and big oil by Man on Dog. Chuck reiterated his true independence from special interest money as the PAC free and lobbyist free candidate - the only candidate not beholden to anybody but his constituents. He called Man on Dog an absentee landlord and a preacher of bigotry through hate.

PA Senate Debate: Lancaster 4

All three candidates wore suits this time, I guess Casey got the memo that Thurston Howell attire of a navy blazer and khakis is not appropriate for a fucking Senate debate. However, he did not get the memo that he has a huge unibrow. Sorry, but it's just there, I couldn't stop myself from gawking. It's just as distracting as Peter Gallagher's pair of caterpillars, but not as heavy, but only one continuous line. The opening statements started off with Chuck Pennacchio who corrected the moderator's pronunciation of his name. She was saying it with a soft "ch" sound as in "change" instead of the hard "cc" as in the end sound of "clock". She said she was told to not pronounce it like "Pinocchio" to which Chuck quipped back, "No, I'm not Pinocchio, that's the other guy [Sen. Man on Dog]" to a round of laughter from the crowd. Chuck got the center podium, he looked very comfortable even though he was a little under the weather.

Bob started off by saying that he wanted to earn our votes. This is quite different than the Rendell-Reid-Schumer triangle of "VOTE FOR HIM OR WE WILL KILL YOU" method they've been playing to date. I can't think of a single thing that Casey has done on the campaign trail to earn a single vote other than declare himself a Democrat. He came out for the nominations of SCOTUS nominees John Roberts and Samuel Alito. He said that he wants to overturn Roe v. Wade. He said that we should stay the course in Iraq and keep the nuclear option on the table for Iran. He turned down numerous opportunities to debate in the Philly metro area, home of a third of the voters in the state... If that's "earning" a vote, then I should've "earned" a raise of $1M since I go to work everyday and work. Hearing him live in person for the first time definitely showed me just how boring he is. His voice is upper nasaly and he sounds like he's got a mute on, his voice is muffled. Anyone who has taken a public speaking 101 class or speech class in high school or, say, watched TV every knows that you can't just talk in a monotonous voice. It just puts people to sleep. Casey's good at that; putting people to sleep with his "stances" and when you add in his delivery, you've got Candidate NyQuil.

Alan sounded particulary whiny tonight. Which is better than his normal monotonous tone. Nice guy, I've met and spoken to/with him several times, just not a lively guy. He was much livelier tonight though jumping on Casey for not wanting to rebroadcast the debate to make it more available and for not wanting to debate again in Philadelphia and Harrisburg; he got a round of applause for that, we all wanted more debates.

The debate was moderated by NBC local affiliate WGAL8 co-anchor Janelle Stelson [pictured above speaking with Chuck after the debate] who brought some personality to the moderator position. She was more than a person just reading questions. During the opening statments, she quipped in with a little personal comment to each candidate and interjected between questions with follow ups outside of the alotted time when appropriate.

The first question of the night asked the candidates what their first three pieces of legislation would be. Alan was up first and stressed addressing the problem of global warming to which he said that Congresses in the past had passed up crucial opportunities to help the environment; pensions, with too many corporations getting through too many loopholes in escaping payments; elderly working program where people sixty-three and older, if they were to choose to stay in the workforce, would receive untaxed wages/salaries as long as they made under $30K. Chuck stressed universal healthcare to save $163 Billion by eliminating the overhead from private insurers; bilateral trade allowing fair trade instead of free trade and addressing the immigration issue; a living wage, he noted that 25% of Americans and Pennsylvanians are working and still in poverty and concurrently implementing a progressive tax on the top 2% having them pay 50% in taxes - under Ike, the tax rate on the same 2% was above 90% and that tax base helped establish the US as an economic superpower. Bob wanted early childhood education for four-year-olds; fiscal discipline; ethics reform where he railed on Sen. Man on Dog [speaking of ethics, Bob takes money from the same people as Man on Dog].

The fifth question of the night addressed Supreme Court (SCOTUS) appointments and whether or not one should have a test to determine how one should vote for a nominee and whether or not a filibuster is a proper procedural measure. Chuck started off by saying that the partisanship in the nomination process has been largely Republican as they have control of all three branches of government, they're the ones driving the partisanship. He noted that it was a sham to watch his Democratic colleagues "question" the recent SCOTUS nominees Roberts and Alito and that they took the non-answers as answers. He stressed that he would never ask for permission to filibuster from his Democratic collegues; he would simply filibuster and he would've filibustered the Alito nomination. Bob said that he is against getting rid of the filibuster completely, but that he felt that Alito's testimony was truthful and straightforward. Was he watching the same hearing as I was? He said that there should not exist a litmus test, but a consideration of a nominee's character, experience, judicial temperment and judicial philosophy. I'd say that Alito's a pretty shitty choice based on that, but then again, it seems as if we watched different hearings. Alan had been sounding more and more like he was advertising his firm than simply relating issues to him being a practicing pension lawyer running a small business. He asked about the individual litmus tests on choice, civil rights, labor, environment, womens rights - Alito fails all of those litmus tests [touché!].

PA Senate Debate: Lancaster 3

The debate itself was great. But there were stupid rules. Like not being able to take any audio, video or still photography unless you were a credentialed reporter. Fuck you too. I went inside the building carrying a heavy box of Chuck Pennacchio brochures in my hands with my camera bag over one shoulder and my camera across my chest. Two cops stop me and tell me that I can't bring my camera into the debate. I tell them I'll put it away later. They give me a look as if they want me to put it away right in front of them. And then I say that I can't, you know, with this heavy box of stuff in my hands and all. Whatever. And I put the box down and lay out the brochures on the table and people start grabbing them up as quickly as I'm putting out another stack. I head down the hallway to the gymnasium to get a good seat before they're all taken and I'm stopped again, looks like a PR person. She asks if I'm a member of the press [I still hadn't put away my camera because I wanted to get inside quickly]. For a moment there, I think about lying about it to give myself unfettered access all arond the debate floor. But, I didn't, and told her I'd put my camera away as I got to my seat [which I did].

There is an additional rule against using the official debate footage. The campaigns were not to use any of the video footage from the debate of their opponents [or even snippets of themselves?]. PCN talkshow host and professor at Franklin & Marshall [the host of the debate] Terry Madonna had this to say:

"We didn't want this forum in an academic environment to be used by the campaigns," Madonna said. "We are not in the business of helping people win or lose elections."

Now what kind of bullshit is that? What the hell is the fucking point of a debate if you can't show it to the public? While the debate will be re-aired on Lancaster's NBC affiliate in a couple weeks in two parts and perhaps nationally via CSPAN [sweet], it's not easy to get people to sit down and watch almost two hours of debate. Back and forth exchanges on an issue here and there are more effective methinks. But what the hell do I know, I'm not the one pulling strings behind the scenes like Madonna. His hair seemed weirdly dark to me, sorta like he used some of that spary hair stuff, anybody else notice that?

So, I don't have any photos of the debate. I did reel off a bunch afterwards though once the debate was technically over.

There are already three good play by play liveblogs of the debate, so I won't go into every detail. From Politics Philly, Above Average Jane [who watched the first hour] and Factesque who even adds her own in-line color [awesome] commentary while live blogging; eRobin must be one quick typer.

The AP reported that the crowd was about 500 people attended the debate. There was a walkway above the debate floor where the candidates walked along before the debate. I'm assuming they met upstairs to go over the ground rules and draw for the order of opening/closing statements and the order of questioning. First to walk to the doorway leading behind the stage floor was Bob Casey. A round of "Casey" chants came up from the crowd. Closely behind was Alan Sandals who got some shrieks from the crowd. The same person [or few people] kept on shrieking through the debate. It was such an annoying hi-pitched shriek. A few seconds after Alan was Chuck. The crowd wasn't reacting at first, but then he hit the halfwaypoint to the door and then we all went wild. A huge contingient [more than I had met earlier and more than I had anticipated] got up to a roaring standing applause. He held up his fist in the air to us as he rounded the corner to the door. We kept cheering for another few seconds. The people on the floor with their Casey stickers on looked absolutely stunned at our enthusiasm. I really think they were shocked at the response Chuck got, fuckers never knew what hit 'em.

PA Senate Debate: Lancaster 2

Montville Mayor and Chuck Pennacchio supporter Connie Guy took the stage and gave a wonderful speech about changing America, getting Sen. Man on Dog out and voting in Sen. Pennacchio.

Editor and Publisher of OpEdNews.com Rob Kall got up to speak to the crowd. The same man behind the PA Zogby poll which broke ground as the first poll commissioned by a progressive organization about a Senate race. Kall spoke of change as well and backed it up with the stats from the Zogby/OpEdNews poll; when voters know the stances on the issues, Pennacchio comes out on top.

Just about everyone there had on a button, but this guy's flat brim old-schoolie with "Outsource Santorum" bumper sticker stuck onto the front was a nice creative twist.

Chuck closed out the rally and got the crowd riled up with a call for us citizens to take back our country. He noted that he didn't want to get too hyped up just yet so that he could save his energy for the long debate which was to start only thirty minutes later. I haven't seen him run out of energy yet. It's quite amazing being this close to a candidate and to the heat of the campaign to see him day in and day out heading to event after event after event just about every day now. This marked his 297th event on the campaign trail since the 2004 election. Number 296 was yesterday morning as he accepted the endorsement of the grassroots organization Neighborhood Networks at a press conference in Rittenhouse Square.

Some more shots from the rally in a flickr set.

PA Senate Debate: Lancaster 1

Yesterday's pre-debate rally, the debate and the post-debate gathering with the college Democrats were all great. Aside from the über slow start to get out to Lancaster [traffic was crawling on the turnpike so we had to detour to 202 and then 30 to get out there], everything went pretty smoothly.

Once at Frankline & Marshall's campus [that's where the debate was], we unpacked ourselves from the car. I can't recall the last time I was in a 4-door sedan with five total people. The trip wasn't bad though, the company was great and I got to whine about how I hate baseball, don't think [professional/MLB] baseball players are real athletes, how I hate golf and my liking of peanut butter, but the extra chunky, not that smooth crap. Rivalvies were made with my fellow backseat carmates.

There was already a sizable crowd out at the rally at about 4.30p. The crowd grew to about seventy-five or 100 soon afterwards. We weren't there alone though. By the entrance, there was a group of what looked like the nastiest of the nasty, college-aged young Republicans. I don't understand them. And not only were they pro-Santorum, they brought out their stupid PA-Sen mascot "Bobby the Duck" - probably the lamest move I've seen from the Right since the idiots who dressed up as foam flip flops when Michael Moore came to Philly to speak at Temple in October of 2004. Sad. So sad. It almost makes me feel sorry for them, but then I remember who they're supporting and I don't feel so bad anymore.

On a side note, oh how I loved that horrible 1986 movie Howard the Duck. I don't know how many times I watched that on WPIX channel 11 in NY back in the day, maybe as many times as the Johnny 5 series. My favorite exchange during the movie: When Howard sleeps with the human woman the next morning the woman picks up a handful of feathers from the bed and asks: "What's this?" Howard looks to her and says: "Souveniers" — oh the hilarity. I swear, only Austin out in Chicago will get this. If not him, nobody.

The parking lot was filled with cars like the one above. Anti-W. Anti-Sen. Man on Dog. Pro-Chuck. It was quite awesome.

A band came on stage to entertain the crowd before several speakers and then Chuck Pennacchio came up there to speak for a few minutes to get the crowd going before we filed inside to get some good seats. The band was great and the guy on the mouth harp [can't see him, he's behind the lead singer/guitarist on the right] was sweet. I love me some harp.

Roosevelt Island Tram Craziness

The air-tram in NYC connecting Manhattan Island to Roosevelt Island stalled yesterday stranding seventy or so people 150' above the East river for a total of twelve hours. Gothamist has coverage here and here with this great photo via flickr.

I've never been on the tram, but I've always wanted to take a ride across on it. This doesn't stop me from wanting to make that trip on that thing. If they find some kind of fatal flaw, now that would change my mind, we'll see. And a random tidbit of NYC knowledge. Main St, New York, NY is on Roosevelt Island. One of my college friends was actually from there.

PA Senate Debate 7p

I'm headed out to Lancaster today to attend the second Democratic PA senate primary debate. It's on tonight at 7p on PCN [channel listing]. They livestreamed it on the PCN TV website last time and they may very well do so again this time around. I'll be there early for a Chuck Pennacchio rally and I'll be rooting for Chuck during the debate. Hopefully I'll get some nice shots along the way.

Factesque and PoliticsPhilly will be livebloging the debate. eRobin's liveblog of the first debate. The first debate in full — that's a 214MB file of good quality QT format video clocking in at 1.5 hrs so don't save that file unless you're on broadband.

McClellan Resigns, Bush Looks Forward to Reminiscing

White House Press Secretary Scott "Flounder" McClellan has resigned. Dubya had these idiotic words:

Bush said McClellan had "a challenging assignment."

"I thought he handled his assignment with class, integrity," the president said. "It's going to be hard to replace Scott, but nevertheless he made the decision and I accepted it. One of these days, he and I are going to be rocking in chairs in Texas and talking about the good old days."

The fucking "good old days" — holy shit. Doesn't that sound just bat-fucking-shit insane?

Yeah, remember those good old days where we raped the world for billions? How we lead the world to war on false pretenses? How we caught that guy, what's his name, oh wait... we never did catch that what's his name guy did we? How we killed the middle class of America? How we liberated all those Arabs? How we saved all those people during Hurricane Katrina? How we... what were we talking about? Oh yes, the "good old days" that's right...

Fireman's Hall Museum

I've never been inside the Fireman's Hall Museum, but I walked by it over the weekend and it's a gorgeous building from the outside. I'd like to head back to Old City to have a looksy as to what's inside this building and the rest of the museum

It's a 100+ year old building which underwent renovations in the late seventies [a thorough cleaning, installation of a stained glass window, climate control and an additional wing] via some special Philadelphia Bicentennial funding. More on the history of the building here.

South St Bridge Graffiti

I took a stroll across South St bridge for the first time over the weekend. I had crossed it several times by car, but never on foot. I had been told by Miss Plum [one half of The Unharshed Mellow] that there was a good amount of graffiti all over the bridge and indeed there was.

The grouping above was my favorite out of them all. The double pasteup of W with his codpiece flightsuit with the infamous "Mission Accomplished!" as a header and footer juxtaposed by a graphic "No War" illustration. The "No War" illustration brings to mind Edvard Munch's The Scream, but this time, the eyes are covered, not the ears.

There still exists a blood-curdling inaudible scream coming out of the mouth of the person in the illustration, but now, s/he cannot bear to look at the atrocities behind them either. A soldier with a boot on top of a seemingly dead civilian and more soldiers standing on top of a tank. The tank draws me to the image of Tank Man from nearly two decades ago.

Politics aside, it's a nice walk and has a busy view back towards Center City. Twenty-three shots up in a flickr set.