The LuLac Edition #1537, April 7th, 2011

PHOTO INDEX: "I'M STUPID AND I VOTE" LOGO, LUZERNE COUNTY GOP COUNTY COUNCIL CANDIDATE HARRY HAAS WHO IS HAVING A MEET AND GREET ON APRIL 14TH AT GOP HEADQUARTERS IN WILKES BARRE STARTING AT 6PM, OUR BLOG FEST LOGO (FRIDAY APRIL 29TH AT ROONEY'S IN PITTSTON STARTING AT 6PM) AND OUR 1972 LOGO.

THE BUDGET BATTLE

The budget battle with the GOP just might be a case of history repeating itself. Look for President Obama to do what Bill Clinton did in the 90s and expose the Republicans as the heartless bastards they’ve always been. The Republicans seem hell bent on reversing a lot of programs that middle class folks need and want. These programs have been part and parcel of citizens for the last 60 years. The GOP wants to cut programs like HeadStart, reconfigure Social Security and fool with Medicare. Is it the GOP’s fault? Nope. It’s the fault of those unthinking people who put them in office. These guys mean business, they aren’t going to cut the big business backers who put them there. They aren’t going to cut the legs off the high flying Wall Street Wizards who nearly screwed this country financially. Nope, they are going to cut programs that mean the most to the middle class. That’s because the middle class is totally misinformed and buys into the crap they hear on the radio and on Fox News. You can scream all you want about your stupid, unborn grand children (presuming that you can get yourself a partner who’ll stand to be in the same room with you) paying off the massive debt, you can rail on talk radio about how America is putting itself in slavery (even though you don’t know the meaning of the freaking word-ask a black person who couldn’t use the same bathroom as whites in the 50s about prejudice, the ancestor of slavery) and you can cry all you want about how the immigrants are taking our jobs. (You will never mention that all of the major corporations have outsourced our jobs!) If there is a federal shutdown it would undermine the economic recovery, delay pay to U.S. troops fighting in three wars, slow the processing of tax returns and limit small business loans and government-backed mortgages during peak home buying season. Yeah, wave your red, white and blue and put your Support Our Troops decal ribbons on your cars, a lot of good that’s going to do a soldier risking their lives for no pay. Yeah, bitch all you want about how bad Obama is and how horrible the Democrats are to your cause. But the fact of the matter is you voted against your own interest in this last election. You made a GOP House of Representatives happen in Washington and you allowed the Statewide Republicans to have a clean sweep in Pennsylvania. It is ironic that in this budget battle, the heavily maligned Democrats are going to have to fight to save the middle class from extinction because you were too stupid to not vote in your own interests.

MEDICARE CHANGES?

Hey, if I were like a lot of Americans, I really shouldn’t give a crap about the proposed changes in Medicare that the GOP wants to implement. I should think like the top 5% of the rich in this country, “I’m over 54, I got mine so you people who will be screwed in the future-too bad”. But I can’t do this. The GOP want to gut Medicare. This is what they want to do: House Republicans’ 2012 federal budget proposal will include significant changes to Medicare, shift control of Medicaid to the states and aim to chop more than $4 trillion from the deficit over the next decade. That from House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan. Ryan’s plan includes a combination of entitlement changes and spending cuts that amount to a significantly different approach to deficit and debt reduction than that advocated by President Barack Obama. Obama’s plan, proposed in February, would cut $1.1 trillion from the deficit over 10 years through a combination of increased revenues and targeted budget cuts. He did not suggest structural changes to the nation’s social safety-net programs — Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. But Ryan and the GOP did and will. Republicans said that plan ignored the primary drivers of the escalating debt and deficits, as well as the solutions proposed by a commission Obama appointed to draft a deficit-reduction plan. In contrast, the Republican budget would change entitlement programs as recommended by the commission.The proposal would rework Medicare by offering seniors a choice of private plans and restructure Medicaid funding into block grants distributed to the states, while apparently leaving Social Security unchanged, Ryan said. The changes would not affect current recipients of Medicare, he said. The Wisconsin Republican declined to offer savings estimates, but said the plan would go further than the commission’s recommendations, which proposed nearly $4 trillion in deficit reduction through 2020. Again, major corporations like GE pay no taxes and oil companies are subsidized which contributes to the debt. But let’s not go after them, let’s go after the taxpayers and screw them out of their health and retirement benefits. Yeah, hand me a voucher, that’ll do the trick. Some fat cat GOP contributor already has the contract for them.

GOTTA LOVE THE GOP

State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe says he’s sponsoring a right-to-work bill targeting both the public and private sectors. The Butler County Republican says the Wisconsin brouhaha may help that bill. The bill will not make it mandatory for people to join unions in the Commonwealth. This is so typically Republican! Hiding under the guise of freedom of choice and limited mandates, this bill would essentially eliminate unions and their wages in the Commonwealth. These same Conservatives won’t give a woman a choice in her biological reproduction alternatives but will take away the mandate that everyone must join a union. You know what? They don’t. I personally know a few people who refused to strike in a school district dispute. It was their choice. It was America. And damn if the union guys didn’t show up for their retirement parties. Metcalfe’s bill might try to eliminate mandates for joining a union but the bigger picture here is that it is still another attempt to bring in lower wages and those kick ass $9.00 an hour jobs to Pennsylvania.

POWER COUPLE REDUX

A former employee of the House Democrats who cooperated with prosecutors in Pennsylvania’s legislative corruption scandal was sentenced the other day to six to 18 months in a county prison work-release program. Scott Brubaker played a role in implementing a scheme to pay bonuses to staffers as illegal rewards for political campaign work. The Harrisburg Patriot reports that Dauphin County Judge Richard Lewis also sentenced Brubaker’s wife and co-defendant, Jennifer Brubaker, to five years’ probation because of her limited role in the “bonusgate“ scandal, her cooperation in the case and the needs of the couple’s 8-year-old daughter. Scott Brubaker, the caucus’ former director of staffing and administration, and Jennifer Brubaker, its former legislative research director, separately addressed the judge in trembling voices during an emotional, hour-long hearing. Look, they got caught and caught a break with a sympathetic Judge. Despite their convictions, their good luck continues.

ECTV

This Monday, April 11th. Host Judge Tom Munley and co-host David DeCosmo will welcome Austin Burke from the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce as their guest on the program. He'll be discussing the outlook for the area during the year including the Scranton connection to 'The Office" television series. The program airs live Monday at Noon and is then recorded for re-broadcast at Noon and Midnight throughout the week.

SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE

This week Shadoe Steele welcomes mega star Deborah Harry from Blondie. This guy has interviewed everyone in music. Saturday Night Live At the oldies airs every Saturday from 7PM to midnight on WILK AM and FM with ABC News at the top of the hour.

SUNDAY MAGAZINE

This Weekend on Sunday Magazine April 10
This Week In Harrisburg examines a call for the Pennsylvania D.E.P. to reverse its new policy on gas drilling violations. The State House voted unanimously to ban thesale of bath salts in Pa. State Rep. Tara Toohil of Luzerne County weighs in. House Majority Leader Mike Turzai is confident the General Assembly can pass a state budget on time for the first time in 8 years, and a resolution sponsored by Senator Lisa Boscola of Northampton County honors Monroe county on its 175th anniversary. Brian Hughes speaks with Dr Steven Thomas, Music Director of the Robert Dale Chorale about their 4th Annual Pops Concert, “For Love Or Money” Fri April 15th at the Scranton Cultural Center.
Brian speaks with Sharon Gang from the Capitol Visitors Center in Washington D.C. about what’s new at the center, and how the center is commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. And an encore of Brian’s interview with Kellie and Amy about “Kellie’s Kause”, coming up Sun April 10th at the West Wyoming Fire Department Social Hall. Sunday Magazine, Sunday morning at 5:30am on JR 93.7 & 97BHT, 6am on 97.9X, 6:30am on Magic 93, and 9:30am on WARM 590 AM.


1972

Bewitched starring Elizabeth Montgomery and Dick Sargent aired its final episode, "The Truth, Nothing but the Truth, So Help Me Sam" on ABC……On the Vietnam War: The Easter Offensive begins after North Vietnamese forces cross into the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) of South Vietnam……The code for Roadside Rest areas is updated by the Shapp administration and put into effect this week…………..in Wilkes Barre Mayor Con Salwoski heads up the committee to elect Edmund Muskie President. Salwoski is extremely busy with the ceremonial duties under the City Manager form of Government attending many political events leading up to the crucial Pennsylvania primary…….and 39 years ago the number 1song in America and LuLac land was The Stylistics and “Betcha By Golly-Wow”. Really.