Truth is the call for debates is predictable. Candidates trailing in polls and money call for debates; candidates leading in polls and money do not.
These guys are just playing their parts.
I hope there are several (but not 14) debates, targeted on specifics such as the state economy, reform issues and Corbett's no-tax pledge. That way, voters have a chance of hearing more than the same general questions and rehearsed answers.
Still, the race today is Corbett's to lose.
The only independent polls since the primaries are by Rasmussen Reports: one in May had Corbett up 13 points; one this month up 16 points. (One GOP wag says that Onorato should ask for 16 debates, one for each point behind.) The money count has Corbett with triple Onorato's cash: $3.3 million to $1 million.
All this will change. Both will have plenty of money, and open-seat races tend to be close.
Onorato, the Allegheny County executive, is running on claims that he brought cost-savings and reforms to his county and can do the same for his state. His pitch is that, because of the economy, the state needs a manager (he's a lawyer and CPA), not a top cop.
Corbett, the attorney general prosecuting lawmakers as part of a corruption probe, argues that it's time for smaller government and that the only way to cut costs is to take taxes off the table, hence his no-tax pledge.
Both play Harrisburg's-a-mess and I'm-a-reformer cards.
The probe gives Corbett cleanup cred. But Onorato consolidated government and cut political jobs in Allegheny County. "If Tom wants to have a debate on how to reform government," Onorato said in a conference call this week, "bring it on."
Both vastly overstate their ability to enact legislative reforms, such as cutting the size of the Legislature, term limits or ending per diem expenses. Only the Legislature can do these things.
But there are differences between these two and how they'd govern that should make for good debates.
