Free Republic

Batchelor discusses the politics of "Tom Corbett and the Space Corps 2018"... with science-writer & space-historian Robert Zimmerman.

Ronnie Corbett, a diminutive British comedian with an outsized personality, exquisite timing and a heart of gold, died Thursday at the age of 85. He had spent decades on TV and was one of the country's best-loved entertainers.

Pennsylvania Republicans said Wednesday their majority in the state House will be the largest in more than half a century after a sweeping Election Day victory. The party gained at least eight seats and a western Pennsylvania race in which the incumbent Democrat was holding a narrow lead was considered too close to call.

Voters in Pennsylvania chose first-time candidate Tom Wolf (D) over Gov. Tom Corbett (R) as their new governor on Tuesday. Multiple outlets called the race for Wolf immediately after polls closed on Tuesday evening. With the loss, Corbett became the first governor in the state’s modern history to lose a reelection race. Wolf, a longtime businessman who turned around his family’s cabinet company, had maintained a strong and steady lead in polling ahead of the election, though the incumbent’s campaign claimed that the tide was shifting and momentum had turned in his favor in recent days. Corbett’s approval ratings in...

Tomorrow, October 28, Governor Tom Corbett (R) will sign House Bill 80 into law, strengthening Pennsylvania’s firearm preemption statute. This bill takes effect in sixty days. After four years of hard work, your NRA looks forward to this momentous event in a culmination of all the efforts that NRA members, Second Amendment supporters and Pennsylvania legislators finally accomplished. If you are able, please attend the bill signing ceremony with Governor Tom Corbett and pro-gun members of the Pennsylvania legislature. Event details and information is provided below: Bill Signing Ceremony for House Bill 80 Tuesday, October 28 at 4:00 P.M. Dormont...

Gov. Tom Corbett blasted the General Assembly and line-item vetoed more than $70 million from the budget but signed the rest of it into law Thursday. The line-item veto removed $65 million in proposed spending from the General Assembly's own funding, which he said was equivalent to the legislators' surplus, as well as $7.2 million from general appropriations. (snip) Corbett reserved more ire for the General Assembly in what he said was its failure to address the public-pension crisis, an issue he has campaigned for big changes including a move toward a 401(k)-style system for new state employee and public...

If elected governor, Tom Wolf plans to end the asset test, a measure that ties federal food stamp benefits to people's bank accounts and car ownership. The Democrat would also work to reestablish General Assistance (GA), which used to pay $205 a month to people who were both poor and disabled. Both moves would reverse initiatives by Gov. Corbett, who saw the asset test as a way to cut down on fraud and waste, and GA as an unnecessary institution from the 1930s whose elimination has saved the state $150 million a year. The Republican governor added the asset test...

HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) - A new poll shows Tom Corbett is closing in on Democratic challenger Tom Wolf in the final weeks before the November election, but the Republican governor still faces a seven-point gap. The Magellan Strategies BR survey commissioned by Keystone Report shows Wolf leads Corbett 49-42 percent

HARRISBURG – The Corbett-Cawley campaign today drew attention to Secretary Tom Wolf’s ever-evolving excuses as to why he cannot provide the details on his plan to raise the income tax rate by 188 percent. Wolf embraces his inner-Nancy Pelosi in his latest excuse, arguing that the voters are not allowed to see what is in his tax plan until the election is over.

I have read about 5 percent of the noise surrounding the upcoming governor’s race in Pennsylvania. As a former member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, I’m always amazed at what issues become amplified, minimized, and often buried. Less than 1 percent of the voters will read this little note, but as a son of teachers, and a friend to many current and retired teachers, administrators and state workers, I believe some facts deserve being said. There is no doubt; incoming governors and other elected officials inherit the good, bad and ugly of the preceding budgets and sessions. There is...

Ending a yearlong negotiation, the Obama administration on Thursday approved Gov. Corbett's alternative Medicaid expansion proposal, a step that could extend health-care benefits to roughly 600,000 uninsured Pennsylvanians. In what was described as a five-year demonstration project, Pennsylvania got the go-ahead to use federal money to pay private insurers to provide health care to uninsured individuals - many in low-wage jobs. The Obama administration praised Pennsylvania for joining other states that opted into the program under the Affordable Care Act. Corbett administration officials called the agreement a successful compromise.

AUGUST 31, 2014 Anatomy of a GOP Disaster: Losing Pennsylvania Governor Corbett has lost support by raising taxes and giving ground to public-sector unions. By John Fund All over the country Republican governors are either poised for easy reelection (such as Ohio’s John Kasich and Nevada’s Brian Sandoval) or running even or better against Democrats (Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Florida’s Rick Scott). Then there is Governor Tom Corbett in Pennsylvania. The latest independent poll has him down a shocking 49 percent to 24 percent (with a quarter of voters undecided) against Democrat Tom Wolf. How did Corbett become such an...

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Democratic upstart Tom Wolf leads Republican incumbent Tom Corbett by a formidable 20 points as Pennsylvania's gubernatorial campaign shifts into gear for the general election, according to a poll released Wednesday. The survey of 1,308 Pennsylvania voters by Connecticut-based Quinnipiac University showed Wolf backed by 53 percent and Corbett by 33 percent.

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania's governor says he won't appeal a court decision that struck down the state's gay marriage ban. Gov. Tom Corbett's decision Wednesday means that same-sex marriage will remain legal in Pennsylvania, without the threat that a higher court will reinstate the ban. "I have thoroughly reviewed Judge Jones' opinion in the Whitewood case. Given the high legal threshold set forth by Judge Jones in this case, the case is extremely unlikely to succeed on appeal. Therefore, after review of the opinion and on the advice of my Commonwealth legal team, I have decided not to appeal Judge...

Be careful, Pennsylvania people. You can't afford to blow it this fall. Your great state is, I'm sorry to say, already not so great when it comes to fiscal solvency. Don't make it worse by dumping your Republican governor, Tom Corbett. Despite the Marcellus Shale boom that's turned Pennsylvania into the Saudi Arabia of natural gas, the Keystone State's current fiscal condition is almost as dire as New Jersey's. According to a recent Mercatus Center study of every state's ability to balance its budgets and still pay for health care and pension costs, Pennsylvania is ranked No. 42. Jersey (50),...

State Senate Democrats say borrowing nine billion dollars is the best way to address the state's rising public pension debt. It's a shift from a caucus that has previously supported a wait-and-see approach with the 2010 law that reset scheduled payments into the pension systems. Those payments are set to increase by hundreds of millions of dollars over the next several years, eating up precious funding for other government programs, only to decrease again in 20 to 30 years. Now they Senate Democrats say a $9 billion bond could refinance some of the pension debt. Sen. John Blake (D-Lackawanna) said...

Republican Governor Tom Corbett, who announced he's running for re-election next year, likes to tell Pennsylvanians he hasn't raised taxes. He ran for office four years ago saying he wouldn't raise taxes. But that's exactly what he is doing today when he signs a "transportation funding bill" to fix roads and bridges along with subsidizing public transportation systems (especially in the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh areas). The bill replaces an out in the open 12 cent a gallon gas tax at the pump with a backroom tax on gas at its wholesale price. It also raises registration fees for vehicles in the state...

HARRISBURG - More than $2 billion will soon begin to flow into road and bridge repair and mass-transit improvements after the state House gave final approval Thursday to the long-awaited transportation bill. The House sent the bill - the first comprehensive transportation-funding legislation in 15 years - to Gov. Corbett late in the day with a 113-85 bipartisan vote. With it, Corbett notched a major legislative victory. He said it represented a "new era in resurgent and reenergized Pennsylvania." "This bold transportation plan demonstrates that our elected officials are serious about keeping our residents safe and our economy strong," he...

Tom Corbett is one of the most unpopular politicians in the country. Now his own party is turning on him. The biggest question in Pennsylvania politics right now isn't whether Gov. Tom Corbett will win reelection. It's whether he'll even get the chance. Beset by legislative failures and bleak poll numbers, the Republican looks like the country's most vulnerable governor heading into the 2014 election. And Republicans are questioning whether they should let Corbett face a near-certain defeat when they could find a ready replacement with a much better chance of winning. Already, speculation among GOP operatives has shifted to...

ROCHESTER (WWJ/AP) - A 57-year-old man suspended from Oakland University for writing about his attraction to teachers has filed a lawsuit seeking more than $2 million and four credits for the class. Joseph Corlett says his First Amendment rights were violated by university officials. The school suspended him for three semesters last year after saying he violated a policy against intimidating people on campus. He said he was also warned that he’d be arrested for criminal trespass if he entered the campus during his suspension.