In speech before the rich & powerful, Corbett dreams of returning PA. to the 1899 robber baron age

[JPZenger]

http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Its-all-part-of-Tom-Corbetts-Pennsylvania-fantasy.html

http://www.philly.com/philly/business/20111218_PhillyDeals__Mr__Corbett__do_you_really_want_another_Gilded_Age_.html?cmpid=124488459

Excerpts:

"This otherwise ignored "gem" from a recent speech by Gov. Corbett at the politics-and-money gala known as the Pennsylvania Society:

Gov. Corbett cited "Pennsylvania's Gilded Age, a time of industrial might," with some nostalgia in his remarks Dec. 10 at the Pennsylvania Society's yearly steak dinner for lawmakers, lawyers, lobbyists, and business operatives in the fancy Grand Ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York.

It was an appropriate setting. Maybe too appropriate.

The society holds its conclave in New York, as it has since 1899, amid the trappings of the original Gilded Age, when wealthy Pennsylvanians, and the state's finances, were relocating to the nation's metropolis.

The Gilded Age, before income taxes, antitrust prosecutions, and immigration restrictions, was a time of boom-and-bust growth for aggressive upstate timber, coal, and oil operators."

[blue neen]

1. Why wasn't this "gala" held in Pennsylvania?

It was for the Pennsylvania Society, so the money should have been spent in this state.

Oh, that's right. Tom Corbett could not care less what truly happens to Pennsylvanians, unless they are extremely rich.

[badhair77]

2. This issue always irritates me.

That money should be spent in PA. You don't see the glitterati of NY state tromping off to PA. Have you ever seen this event on the PA network? The black tie dinner is obscene, especially in these bare bones times. And now he is going to donate his raise to charity. So it will be an income tax deduction and a lift to his pension. I must stop - my blood pressure can only stand so much Corbett talk in one day.