KEISLING: Is Tom Wolf’s moral compass broken?

Gov. Tom earolf tries going along to get along with GOP leaders. But what’s he getting from Senate Republicans with whom he’s going along?

Gov. Wolf isn’t using the bully pulpit of the governor’s office to speak out on issues of right and wrong, and matters of importance for everyday Pennsylvanians.

 

By Bill Keisling

To get along in politics, the old saw goes, you have to go along.

But in politically corrupt Pennsylvania going along is hardly ever a good idea.

Take the example of Gov. Tom Wolf, who now risks alienating his own base because he now has a bad case of going-along-itis.

Last year, Gov. Tom Wolf was at odds with legislative Republicans in a budget stand off that dragged on for most of a year.

Gov. Wolf defined himself in his first year of office as someone who dug in his heels and refused to go along on matters of principle.

But not this year.

This year, Gov. Wolf has taken the opposite tack: he appears ready and willing to appease Republican leaders at every turn — no matter how bad the issue or the policy.

In several important matters, Gov. Wolf has even thrown in with Republican legislative leaders, but hasn’t got much if anything to show for it, except a black eye.

Not only has Gov. Wolf’s appeasement of Republicans created bad policy. It’s weakened Wolf, and made him look bad with his own Democratic base.

Take, for example, the Wolf’s administration’s lackey role in supporting the GOP leader’s attempts to change the state constitution to raise the retirement age of judges from 70 to 75.

In the primary election this April 26, almost 2.4 million voters cast their ballots on the issue, and defeated the proposal by 47,594 votes.

But Gov. Wolf and his secretary of state found themselves on the wrong side of this important matter when they essentially backed and helped facilitate a Republican plan for a do-over election in November with a reworded ballot question designed to confuse voters to pass the constitutional change.

Forget for a moment that the state’s judiciary, wracked by scandal, is undeserving of a lengthened retirement age. Forget as well the state’s constitutional framers had good reasons to limit the terms of judges to age 70.

By not speaking out against this blatantly deceitful and undeserved power grab, the Wolf administration found itself sued by its own allies, Senate Democrats, in an unsuccessful effort to stop the do-over election.

Instead of standing up and saying this is wrong, Wolf went along, and now the dishonest ballot question will be placed before state voters this November.

 

Gov. Wolf’s questionable appeasement of Republican whims didn’t stop there.

Last week, Gov. Wolf and Senate Republicans strangely cooperated to speedily replace acting AG Bruce Castor with Gov. Wolf’s patronage pick, Bruce Beemer.

The Republicans obviously would like to stop the release of Special Prosecutor Doug Gansler’s report on pornographic emails. Gansler’s report threatens to implicate many of the same afore-mentioned judges in porno trading with prosecutors.

Though it’s not certain the release Gansler’s report will or can be stopped, the spectacle of the Republican-controlled Senate rushing back into session from vacation — a month early — to vote unanimously for Democrat Wolf’s nominee certainly suggested Wolf has made some unsavory secret deal or another with GOP senators.

What Gov. Wolf doesn’t seem to grasp is that Republican Senate leaders would just as quickly throw him overboard, if given a chance, as they threw overboard AGs Kane and Castor, and as they would like to throw overboard Special Prosecutor Gansler.

 

Gov. Wolf instead acts as though he wants to be buddies with GOP legislative leaders, and will do anything to go along to get along with them.

Like former AG Kane, Gov. Wolf doesn’t seem to grasp that he’s swimming with sharks.

The slim-to-no-chance of Gov. Wolf getting along with GOP legislators to produce something good was again driven home this week, when GOP legislative leaders signaled they’re likely to cancel a special legislative session on opioid addiction they proposed only two months ago.

The state constitution empowers either the legislature or the governor to call for such a special legislative session. The special session on opioid addiction was proposed by the GOP-controlled legislature, not Gov. Wolf.

In June, Gov. Wolf appeared alongside GOP leaders on the state capitol’s rotunda steps talking about the importance of a special session on the opioid drug problem.

“We all know it’s not a Democratic problem or a Republican problem, but a Pennsylvania problem,” GOP House Speaker Mike Turzai said at the time, standing beside a warily doe-eyed Gov. Wolf on the rotunda steps.

“The overwhelming conclusion is we need to do something now,”  Gov. Wolf told those packed into the rotunda.

 

And they were right, for a change.

Even a casual read of state newspapers reveals a severe and growing problem with heroin and other opioid drugs in Pennsylvania.

Families and communities are being torn apart and destroyed by heroin and prescription drugs, and their knock-offs.

So why do GOP leaders now want to cancel the proposed special legislative session?

The pharmaceutical industry, which gives large donations to incumbent GOP legislators, fears it will become the whipping boy for the opioid problem.

The legislature obviously should take a critical look at Big Pharma’s role in making opioid drugs like Oxycontin and Fentanyl (which recently contributed to the death of pop star Prince) so readily available to the public.

But to do that GOP leaders would have to bite the hand that feeds its legislative caucus.

Still, if Gov. Wolf wants, he can defy compromised GOP leaders by calling for the legislative special session himself.

But don’t hold your breath.

 

So what’s up with Gov. Tom Wolf?

“I think Wolf got himself into a bad situation with his first budget and now he’s gun shy,” Penn State alumni trustee Anthony Lubrano tells me.

” I don’t know that any of us knows what Wolf believes in because he won’t say what he believes,” Lubrano says. “It’s such an example of poor leadership.”

Lubrano goes on, “I think Tom Wolf is an honorable guy. I just don’t think Wolf has spent enough time to understand the issues, and the people around him haven’t taken the time to understand the issues either.

“I don’t see it anywhere.”

 

Lubrano points to a trustee vote in July to increase tuition at Penn State.

“A perfect example is the tuition increase,” Lubrano says. ” This governor says he wants to ensure that education remains within reach of every Pennsylvanian. But rather than have a discussion with (PSU President) Eric Barron about the importance of a tuition freeze, Gov. Wolf had one secretary in attendance who did vote against the budget.”

But other members of Wolf’s cabinet who were eligible to vote as trustees didn’t attend the meeting.

So Gov. Wolf’s supposed opposition to a tuition hike at the end of the day came across as either half-hearted, half-baked, tepid, and / or ineffective.

Gov. Bob Casey, who played for Holy Cross on a basketball scholarship, used to speak of making a “full-court press,” and fighting hard, with all your heart and everything you’ve got, on issues of importance to the people of Pennsylvania.

Gov. Wolf, on the other hand, won’t even make a half-court press.

 

By not fighting hard enough against entrenched interests, Wolf essentially allowed the tuition increase to pass, Lubrano suggests.

“As far as Wolf is concerned, I wish Tom would have been more forceful to speak out about how the cost of education should remain within reach of Pennsylvanians,” Lubrano says.

Is Gov. Tom Wolf gun shy, not forceful enough, or doesn’t he have a moral compass?

No matter the cause, Gov. Wolf certainly isn’t using the bully pulpit of the governor’s office to speak out on issues of right and wrong, and matters of importance for everyday Pennsylvanians.

And that’s hurting Pennsylvanians.

It’s also hurting Tom Wolf.

If he has a backbone, Gov. Wolf will call for a special legislative session on opioid addiction himself — and to hell with GOP leaders and the pharmaceutical industry.

That would be the right thing to do.

 

As Gov. Wolf himself said in June, “The overwhelming conclusion is we need to do something now.”