John Baer: Pa. pols in the zone ... the Twilight Zone

WARNING: YOU are entering another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind - an election cycle for Pennsylvania governor with multiple candidates.

Your next stop? The Political Twilight Zone.

Allow me to be your guide.

Philly's own Tom "Fort" Knox just issued a "detailed" proposal calling for - stunner! - reforms in Harrisburg.

The Democratic multimillionaire and former mayoral candidate wants to limit campaign contributions and reduce the size of the Legislature.

This he'd do by convening a "special session" of lawmakers.

(I think our lawmakers are kinda special already, don't you?)

Knox clearly is operating in a different dimension. Just think of that do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do theme song when you see his TV ads.

Campaign-finance reform and cutting the Legislature's size are great ideas offered all the time. It's just that they require the Legislature itself - while trying to do budgets and dodge indictments - to pass legislation limiting its own campaign funds, then pass legislation eliminating its jobs.

Think any governor can make our lawmakers act against their interests? Maybe you should wish real hard and clap three times.

Oh, yeah, Knox also says that officeholders should resign if running for a different office. Gee, that would be all of his potential opponents.

Hey, wait, you don't think the money thing and the resign-from-office thing have anything to do with benefiting Knox, do you?

Nah. I'm sure that any day now Democrats such as Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato, Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Hoeffel, state Auditor General Jack Wagner and Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty will race to various podiums to announce, "My God, Tom's right, I quit! It's the only honest thing to do!"

But Knox is not alone in the Twilight Zone.

Republican Tom Corbett, the state attorney general, says that he'll "turn on the power of Pennsylvania" and restore trust in government. I thought that filing criminal charges against other pols was turning on the power of Pennsylvania.

Corbett also says that, for many, "the American dream is a broken promise," but that "as governor, I'm going to change that."

Rod Serling would be proud.

Republican suburban U.S. Rep. Jim Gerlach, a former state lawmaker challenging Corbett in the primary, has a "pledge" to fix Pennsylvania's "broken" government.

No word yet on his willingness to also fix the broken dream.

Gerlach's pledge includes (and you tell me if any of this sounds familiar) limiting government, eliminating waste, creating good-paying jobs, cutting taxes and working for "quality, affordable health care."

He'd also make lawmakers "lose a day's pay" for every day a state budget is late. He doesn't mention that such action would require an act of the Legislature or how he'd get them to punish themselves, but then we've already washed that rag.

Democrat Onorato has a "vision." He sees every child, no matter where he or she lives (and you probably can finish this without reading farther), getting a "quality education, because that is the key to achieving [wait for it] the American Dream." Presumably not Corbett's broken one.

More candidates are likely. Uberconservative GOP state Rep. Sam Rohrer, of Berks County, reportedly plans to announce next week. Don't be surprised if he advocates abolishing all government.

And, look, platitudes and pandering are part of politics. Much of what you'll hear from these candidates is stuff that ought to happen.

Just be prepared to separate the promises from the possible. Demand details. Otherwise, you'll wander between light and shadow, between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. You'll awake in a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of the imagination. You'll be in Pennsylvania's Political Twilight Zone.

Send e-mail to baerj@phillynews.com.

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