G. Terry Madonna & Michael L. Young
Thu, September 02, 2010
Obama's Best Bad Option
One of Shakespeare's most popular plays is "A Midsummer Night's Dream," a comedy, focused on magic and distinguishing fantasy from reality. Right about now, President Obama is probably ...
Tue, August 24, 2010
Politically Uncorrected
That Other Tax Problem
Taxes increasingly occupy the national mind. Should we raise them, lower them, let them alone, or just talk about them? Certainly we are doing enough of the latter.
The Obama ...
Fri, August 20, 2010
Medical Marijuana and Pennsylvania
On August 3, a coalition of mostly liberal activists initiated a national campaign to legalize marijuana using the slogan, "Just Say Now." The first test case occurs this fall in ...
Thu, August 05, 2010
Dumb & Dumber
Somebody needs to check Pennsylvania's water supply. Perhaps it's something those guys are drinking, or maybe smoking, that explains the faux pas outbreak spreading in the Keystone State. Either way, ...
Tue, July 27, 2010
PA's Long-Running One-Act Play
All sorts run for governor of Pennsylvania. There have been mayors,
prosecutors, congressmen, judges, state legislators, businessmen, statewide
elected officials, and even a lieutenant ...
Tue, July 06, 2010
Silly Syllogisms and Serious Politics
Syllogisms are mesmerizing little mind games; the sort lonely logicians might play on long, languid evenings. The rules are simple: combine a major premise with a minor premise and draw a conclusion. ...
Wed, June 23, 2010
Toomey-Sestak: Made for Hollywood
If the Pat Toomey-Joe Sestak Pennsylvania Senate race was a movie, it would
be a cinch for an Academy Award nomination. It¹s an electoral show that has
everything: two controversial, ...
Tue, June 01, 2010
Corbett vs. Onorato: A Scheduled 15 Rounder
Pennsylvania, in the lingo of political science, is a "competitive two-party state." In plain English, it's a state where elections are frequently close, usually hard fought, and often hard ...
Wed, May 19, 2010
Arlen Specter's Perfect Storm
The political world watched almost stupefied as the national melodrama played itself out. The pre-primary polls told the startling story while the astonished pols read the increasingly clear tea ...
Thu, May 13, 2010
Two Parties, One Election, No Choices
It's been a yawner—a saccharine affair that has excited few, numbed many, and bored most. We refer, of course, to the alleged Pennsylvania gubernatorial primary "contest" blessedly ...
Tue, April 20, 2010
The Admiral Hits an Iceberg
According to sage Yogi Berra, "it's tough to make predictions, especially about the future."
Nevertheless, we boldly made one about a year ago appraising ...
Mon, April 05, 2010
The Resurrection of Rick Santorum
It was only a matter of time. Apparently that time has arrived. Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, once the U.S. Senate's resident enfant terrible, and more recently think tank habitué and ...
Thu, February 18, 2010
The 99 Percent Rule
Call it the 99 percent rule. 99 percent of criminal trials only matter to a
small cadre of participants. Defendants, victims, judges, defense lawyers,
and prosecutors all play their ...
Thu, January 28, 2010
Politically Uncorrected: The Candidate Myth
"Voters," political scientist V.O. Key famously remarked, "are not fools." By and large that's true. The specious corollary drawn by many politicians, however, is not so true. ...
Tue, January 12, 2010
Restoring Confidence
It's pretty grim. The successive crises of the last several years have produced the greatest erosion of public confidence in the Pennsylvania legislature in modern history. The low confidence levels ...
Mon, December 28, 2009
The Eight Year Cycle - Believe It!
Some believe in it. Many doubt it. Most don't understand it.
The "it" in question here is Pennsylvania's so-called eight-year cycle – the octennial oscillation in state politics ...
