10/31/2005

Power failure

With spending limit legislation, GOP lawmakers show that they don't trust themselves

Republican leaders in the Legislature might not have been aware of it, but they gave voters another reason besides the pay hike to question the merit of them continuing to hold office.

Last week, GOP power brokers introduced legislation that would make it more difficult to increase state spending. They claimed it was an effort to impose fiscal discipline and lower taxes.

House Republican leader Sam Smith went so far as to say that if lawmakers are part of the problem of expanding budgets, then they are trying to be part of the solution.

"Blame us if you will, we are part of the process, but don't blame us for putting in place tools that will help control government spending," he told The Associated Press.

Ponder that, Pennsylvania.

What Smith was really saying - without saying it, of course - was that he and his fellow stop-me-before-I-spend-again Republicans in the House and Senate can't be trusted to do their jobs, now and in the future.

After all, barring some unforeseen meltdown, Republicans will control both chambers of the General Assembly through 2012. Gerrymandering in 2002 and an inept Democratic Party made sure of that.

Republicans also have an excellent chance of extending their power through 2022.

That's because, barring some unforeseen meltdown, the GOP will control the gerrymandering process (otherwise known as reapportionment) following the 2010 federal census.

If the state's growth patterns continue as predicted, more state House and Senate seats will be shifted away from heavily Democratic western Pennsylvania to the GOP friendly central and eastern regions of the commonwealth, which most likely will translate into even more Republican seats in the Legislature in 2012.

With this legislation, Republican lawmakers have acknowledged (albeit in a roundabout manner) that they cannot exercise power responsibly for the next two decades.

This power failure does not bode well for Pennsylvania's future.