The Larry Kane Report

Congress is still not answering the important questions about health care reform, so I would suggest you seek answers soon.

Both the Congressional budget office and the director of Medicare oversight see serious problems in the plan. How, for example, will the health care industry handle the influx of up to 36 million people into the system? Pennsylvania barely has enough doctors to handle the load right now! The Medicare and Medicaid oversight office fears that some doctors may turn away public option patients in favor of those with private plans.

Republicans don’t have many alternatives, but they sure have some good points in insisting on answers to these questions.

PALIN POWER?

For all the concern and hysteria about Sarah Palin actually trying for the White House, Americans are watching her on TV in record numbers. Are we that bored? I mean, she is an interesting story, but she sounds like a broken record.  Maybe it’s our fault. Or John McCain’s. The Newsweek cover was absurd. I mean, Palin is getting the same kind of attention as the Gosselin’s.  It is a circus. But we are eating it up. I think we are bored.

DREDGE THE RIVER?

New Jersey and Delaware are fighting in court to stop the dredging of the Delaware to keep the port competitive. Delaware should pull out of the court battle immediately. The state is in no position to look the other way at the jobs that will be created by the Pennsylvania dredging plan. Delaware is losing jobs rapidly, and New Jersey also needs the economic boost.

PEDAL POWER-

Philadelphia City Council has ok’d the use of licensed pedicabs on the city’s streets. Good move! During the hectic Democratic Convention in Denver last year, I got around very well on the bike cabs. They are fast. “green”, and they don’t reek of cigarette smoke like many Philadelphia taxi cabs.

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In all the debate about health care, I’ve heard very little about preventative care.  There are some provisions for enhanced testing, but strangely, very little incentive and education for people to stay fit. Why? I don’t have a clue. But there is clear evidence that an active lifestyle, embracing healthy food and moderate exercise could keep a lot of people away from the doctor as they get older. Would this save billions in health care? No doubt, and that’s why I’m surprised that there’s not more of an emphasis on preventing disease.

Iran Rage

One of the hallmarks of the Iranian regime in the last 30 years is the irrational and dangerous behavior, the bursts of unexplainable anger that defy any sense of reason. Now the renegade, thug-infested regime says it will charge three American hikers, who lost their way over the summer, with espionage. If the Obama administration, or for that matter, any administration believes there is a chance to reasonably negotiate with this lawless regime, the hiker’s episode is a perfect example of why there is no chance. One more point: The U.S. is asking for the hiker’s release. The U.S. should be demanding their release. One of the hikers is Josh Fattal, who is from Elkins Park.

No Tears For The Attacker, Please, Just the Truth

Already, with much fanfare, some lawmakers are calling for an investigation of how the Army let Major Nidal Malik Hasan fall through the cracks. Although that is a wise investigation, so would a probe of how the medical community gave him a pass as he exhibited strong bouts of anger toward America and the war. The Major faces charges of killing 13 innocents at Fort Hood, Texas, and leaving 29 wounded.

What really concerns me is the beginning of the attacker sympathy, the standard rhetoric about the stress factors that can cause someone to commit mass murder. Whatever the motives, I view this as an act of terror. Motives should be examined, of course, but Major Hasan’s attack was sheer terroristic murder. Stress in time of war is a real problem that should be treated with absolute sensitivity and much more caring than our government has exhibited so far. But this case should be investigated,  not only as a psychotic dilemma, but as an act of war, because that is exactly what it was.

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He was doing well, very well in making his bargaining points until that moment when he made this horrible transit strike personal. I’m talking about Willie Brown, head of TWU Local 234 who took his men and women out in the middle of the night on of all days, election day. Brown held a studious news conference and then he made a statement that could help make this one of the longest Septa strikes ever. Brown said that Mayor Nutter brought nothing to the table, and that he would not sit in the same negotiating room with Nutter. It is true. Mayor Nutter has no cash to bring to the table. That’s a fact. The Governor had some. But the Mayor has none. By attacking the Mayor directly, Brown has misfired, politically and strategically. He has laid the gauntlet down, and this is not going to be pretty.

Will other officials involved in the negotiations boycott the Mayor? Of course not. So, Brown has no choice but to consider eating his words if this thing has any chance of ending  soon.

What could happen? What if this strike lasts for over a month, and the Governor decides to call out the National Guard to help move traffic along? What if the Mayor, snubbed by the union leader, asks powerful Democrats to stay out of the behind the scenes talks?

Brown has to act quickly to fix the personal affront, before it’s too late.

The Mayor says it doesn’t matter, that Septa is conducting the talks. But when someone calls the Mayor “Little Caeser”, as Brown did, bad feelings could rule the day.

CHRIS CHRISTIE –

Before he celebrates too quickly, New Jersey Governor Elect Chris Christie should get a plan to govern. Winning is hard, but governing is harder. That plan should include a reasonable way to cut taxes without turning New Jersey into a lawless and unsafe wasteland. Governing costs money and Christie will soon find out that its easier to make promises than to deliver the goods. If he can deliver the goods, he will not suffer the same fate that Jon Corzine did. My guess is that Christie has a keener understanding of the average wage-earner, and that, in itself, might make him a good governor. Maybe. Maybe not.

The first thing he should do is back off the lawsuit against Pa. to stop dredging of the Delaware River. A first class port needs a first class waterway.

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While Seth Williams is the favorite to succeed Lynne Abraham as DA in Philadelphia, the Jersey Boys are providing quite a spectacle. It’s all about money, power, a free beach house, weight, and a big case of the nasties.

The Jersey Boys are mega millionaire Jon Corzine, the Governor, Chris Christie , the former corruption busting prosecutor, and Chris Daggett, the Independent who has scared the heck out of the other Jersey Boys. But as we go online, the pollsters say that Daggett’s legions may be moving to one candidate or the other. With the race considered a dead heat,  that means that this will be a wild election night. As exciting as the World Series? No, but pretty exciting.

The winner gets a state police escort, a house on the beach at Island Beach state park, an executive mansion, and a horrible budget crisis.

The election should not make New Jerseyans proud. It has not been mud that has been slinged in the 34 million dollars in campaign spending, but sludge, dark sludge that oozes through the airwaves like a creeping menace to issue-oriented campaigning. If you beliieved the ads, Corzine loved taxes with a passion, Christie was singled out for his weight problem, and Daggett got a bye because he wasn’t a threat. But, in politics, yesterday’s lightweight is today’s gunslinger, and right now it appears that Daggett voters will decide this election.

Tonight by ten or 11 o’clock the Jersey Boys will finish their act.  The victor gets a state that has proud, independent voters, who know they need strong leadership to remain solvent. The election is in their hands. As far as the rest of you: don’t complain later if you stay home, and someone else elects a judge or school board member who lets a killer out on parole, or raises your taxes.

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