Governor

Maybe we ought to just let those two bozos duke it out. The winner gets to be governor. We can then forget about the other guy and leave him to the tender ministrations of his cornerman. If the issue is who's the toughest, why the hell isn't Mr. T the governor of some place? This current mud-wrestle for governor of Pennsylvania only demeans the candidates, the voters, the residents and anybody who's flown over on their way to another place. Are the expensive spin doctors Tom Ridge and Mark Singel have hired right that We the People are so damn stupid we think the issue is really which of these two is the nastiest?

Governor deserves respect I must heartily disagree with the perspective of the writer of "Governor's behavior shameful" (Tuesday). I wonder if the letter writer heard the exchange between Gov. Christie and William Brown? Brown gave an editorial of his own before asking a question, and when the governor attempted to answer, Brown repeatedly interrupted Christie. Brown was not interested in an answer to his question. He was there to further an agenda and try to shout over any reasonable explanation the governor had to offer.

The conservative Republican governor and the liberal Democratic senator do not agree. On anything. At all. And they want you to know it. Consider the flurry of news releases from Sen. Frank Lautenberg's office over the last several months eviscerating Gov. Christie for cutting money for women's health, refusing to raise taxes on millionaires, pulling out of a regional greenhouse-gas initiative, and signing a bill that forces public employees to...

Tom Corbett has been governor for six months, and in many ways, if you agree with his agenda - provided you understand what his agenda is - he's been a success. For the first time in almost a decade, the budget passed on time. Facing a $4 billion gap, he reduced state spending. True to his word, and his signed pledge to Grover Norquist, he didn't raise taxes, although why he feels it necessary to be beholden to a Washington management strategist is beyond me. But Corbett has been terrible - flat-out awful - in meeting with the general public and in communicating his agenda, not only to voters but also to his party brethren.

Are you in the governor's crosshairs? Does he want to enact policies that you object to? Care to respond? No problem. It'll cost you just $10,875,011. That's what Gov. Christie's chief nemesis, the New Jersey Education Association teachers union, spent last year for "communications" lobbying: an anti-Christie campaign that featured TV ads, radio spots, and a plane that flew up and down the Jersey Shore proclaiming Christie's love for millionaires. The ads are needed, the NJEA says, to counter Christie's free arsenal (his regular national TV interviews, 45-minute news conferences and near-weekly town hall meetings)

If a Mount Rushmore for actors were erected, you'd expect to see the legends etched in stone, right?? Bogart, Tracy, DeNiro,?Brando, Streep. But wait. Don't put that chisel away just yet. DiFrancesco is feverishly working his way toward being included in that exclusive group. DiFrancesco? Sure, you know him - Donald T., the acting governor of New Jersey. Got the gig when the real governor, Christie Whitman, bolted to Washington for a Bush job. He's taking the acting part seriously, too. The acting governor is inescapable, flexing his acting chops by touting the Garden State's attractions in commercials.

Former Washington Gov. Albert Rosellini, 101, who became the oldest living former governor in America and who brought an everyman personality to the state's top office, died Monday of pneumonia. A Democrat and son of Italian immigrants, he was governor for eight years ending in 1965. His tenure in office was defined by efforts to change state prisons and modernize mental-health institutions. He helped push for the creation of the 520 floating bridge that now bears his name. Mr. Rosellini was a boxer in college and took three jobs to put himself through school.

SANTA FE, N.M. - New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez has dug into her family's ancestry and uncovered immigration documents she says suggest her paternal grandparents followed common practices in coming to the United States from Mexico in the early 1900s, contradicting earlier indications they were illegal immigrants. Martinez, a Republican and the nation's only female Hispanic governor, this year acknowledged that her grandparents came to the United States without immigration documents.

DOVER, Del. - The state Senate gave final approval Wednesday to a bill that would legalize medical marijuana. The legislation cleared the House last week after having passed the Senate, but House lawmakers added two minor changes that required Senate approval. The Senate voted, 17-4, to approve the revised bill, which now goes to Gov. Jack Markell for his signature. - AP

Lynn C. Swann, the former Pittsburgh Steelers star receiver, is considering a Republican bid for Pennsylvania governor in 2006, his office confirmed yesterday. Swann, who has never held elected office, has been reaching out to top GOP officials in recent days to discuss a possible candidacy. He also has talked with one of his potential Republican opponents, state Sen. Jeffrey E. Piccola of Dauphin County. "It was a courtesy call," said Piccola, who also is considering a run for governor.

HARRISBURG - He is being picketed almost daily by demonstrators in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh - a tin man without a heart, they call him. His Facebook page teems with complaints from angry Pennsylvanians. And his poll numbers have started to sag. Enough, say top political advisers, supporters, and fund-raisers to Gov. Corbett. Though they have anxiously watched for months as Corbett has fielded political hits on everything from policy to personality, they are now encouraging the governor to shake things up in hopes of shaking off what they think is turning into a growing image problem.

ATLANTIC CITY — At the East Coast Gaming Congress here on Thursday, Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno sounded more like she was on the campaign stump than simply speaking to gambling-industry executives. Guadagno, a fill-in for Gov. Christie, dodged all questions regarding Internet gaming and sports betting at the gathering in the new Revel Casino. Instead, she chanted a familiar chorus: That it was her boss who ensured that Revel got built with $261 million in state tax credits, who streamlined regulations in the battered gambling town to entice investors, and who was going all-out to get Atlantic City back on track.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Gov. Lincoln Chafee said Rhode Island is working to help former pitcher Curt Schilling's video game company remain viable after it failed to make a scheduled $1.125 million payment to the state's economic development agency. Chafee said Tuesday that the state must do "everything possible" to assist 38 Studios and prevent the state from having to pay the company's debts. The payment to the Economic Development Corp. was due May 1. 38 Studios was lured from Massachusetts in 2010 after Rhode Island offered a $75 million loan guarantee that state officials said would help bring jobs and tax revenue.

MADISON, Wis. - Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett won the Democratic primary Tuesday in Wisconsin's historic recall election, leaving him with a short four weeks to make the closing argument that Republican Gov. Scott Walker should be booted from office after 16 contentious months on the job. Walker easily defeated token opposition in the GOP primary Tuesday, so Barrett's win set up a June 5 rematch of the 2010 governor's race. It was an election that failed to hint at the turmoil to come.

MADISON, Wis. - Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has raised more than $13 million in three months for a recall election, easily shattering the fund-raising record he set last year. Walker became the target of a recall election after he pushed through legislation last year eliminating most public union workers' bargaining rights. His showdown with labor leaders and their Democratic allies made him a celebrity in Republican circles and enabled him to rake in cash at a pace never before seen in Wisconsin.

Democrats who believe they should be governor of New Jersey are banking their donors' dollars in the hope that eight years is far too much Chris Christie for the Garden State. The Republican governor's approval ratings are still stellar, but voters are also increasingly telling pollsters that he's "arrogant. " Will there be a tipping point? Will Christie yell at one constituent too many? Will he belittle one legislator too many? Will he deliver one knockout punch too many at a news conference?

PENNSYLVANIA Democrats face an interesting choice in the April 24 primary election for an office no Pennsylvania Democrat ever won. And that office, state Attorney General, tends to spawn candidates for governor. Of the four Republicans who've won it since it became elective in 1980, three - Ernie Preate, Mike Fisher, Tom Corbett - later ran for governor. So the outcome of next week's race between former Bucks County U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy and former Lackawanna prosecutor Kathleen Kane could not only give Democrats a shot at history but also set the stage for a future contender.

On Feb. 16, Gov. Christie swooped down near MetLife Stadium in a $12.5 million state police helicopter to celebrate the announcement that WrestleMania, World Wrestling Entertainment Inc.'s biggest annual event, would come to New Jersey next year. The 36-minute chopper trip from Ewing to East Rutherford, which saved Christie about an hour of travel time, cost about $1,500, based on the hourly charge. It was his sixth flight in less than two weeks, following trips for events that included a Manhattan speech to a pro-Israel group, a Super Bowl-championship rally for the New York Giants, and a public meeting in Caldwell, Essex County, where he urged towns to cut costs.

HARRISBURG - He is not at war with women. He does have a heart. And he really did a lot of work on that trade mission in March to France and Germany. So said Gov. Corbett on Wednesday when he made his monthly radio talk show appearance on WPHT-AM (1210) in Philadelphia. The governor weighed in on everything from former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum's decision to suspend his Republican presidential bid, to who he thinks would be a good running mate for Mitt Romney, to why he supports legislation pending in the Capitol that would require women who want abortions to get ultrasounds first.

DANE, Wis. - Wisconsin's governor officially hit the campaign trail for the first time Tuesday, kicking off a statewide tour by speaking at a farm in front of a tractor, as Democrats filed signatures needed to take him on in a recall election. Republican Gov. Scott Walker has been airing TV ads since November and traveling the country raising millions of dollars to fight the recall effort. But with the May 5 primary just a month away and the June 5 general election two months out, an intense ground campaign in which Walker and his opponents try to reach voters personally is under way. The recall election, spurred by anger over changes Walker pushed through the Legislature last year to effectively end collective-bargaining rights for most public workers, may be the most prominent campaign in the nation after the presidential race.