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Corbett: 'Bad idea' for Rendell to seek newspaper role

HARRISBURG - Gov. Corbett said Thursday he believed it was a "bad idea" for former Gov. Ed Rendell to be involved in a group of investors seeking to buy The Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly.com.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett unveils his 2012-13 budget proposal before a joint session in the Pennsylvania State House Chamber February 7, 2012. ( TOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer ) EDITORS NOTE:127085 PE1BUDGET08aTG Tue 2/7/2012 Location: State Capitol Harrisburg Story: PE1BUDGET08 / Gov. Corbett delivers his 2012-2013 budget address, expecting cuts across the board with deepest likely to hit higher ed. Also several hundred Occupy protestors planning to protest and confront administration officials in Capitol. Reporter: Worden, Couloumbis
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett unveils his 2012-13 budget proposal before a joint session in the Pennsylvania State House Chamber February 7, 2012. ( TOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer ) EDITORS NOTE:127085 PE1BUDGET08aTG Tue 2/7/2012 Location: State Capitol Harrisburg Story: PE1BUDGET08 / Gov. Corbett delivers his 2012-2013 budget address, expecting cuts across the board with deepest likely to hit higher ed. Also several hundred Occupy protestors planning to protest and confront administration officials in Capitol. Reporter: Worden, CouloumbisRead more
    by By Angela Couloumbis, Inquirer Harrisburg Bureau
    Published 

HARRISBURG - Gov. Corbett said Thursday he believed it was a "bad idea" for former Gov. Ed Rendell to be involved in a group of investors seeking to buy The Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly.com.

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but I look to newspapers to be objective," the Republican governor said. Rendell, he added, "will always be a politician."

Corbett made the comments during his monthly appearance on Dom Giordano's show on 1210 WPHT-AM Philadelphia.

Asked to elaborate later in the day, Corbett added only: "I think it's a bad idea, but it's a free country."

Rendell declined to comment, as did Mark Block, spokesman for Philadelphia Media Network Inc. (PMN), parent company of the newspapers and website.

Evercore Partners, the New York investment-banking firm PMN hired to market the company, also declined to comment.

Earlier this month, Rendell and five others announced their interest in buying the company. The partners include South Jersey Democratic power broker George Norcross III, New Jersey businessman Lewis Katz, and Comcast-Spectacor chairman Edward M. Snider.

During the morning radio show, Giordano asked Corbett whether it was true that Rendell, who recently traveled to the Capitol to criticize Corbett's proposed changes to the state's food-stamp program, actually walked to the governor's office to deliver information on the topic.

That is what his secretary told him, replied Corbett, who mostly made light of the visit. "I wasn't there," the governor said, but he noted that he might have invited Rendell in if he had been.

Still, Corbett said of the visit: "I think that was well beyond the pale of what any former governor has ever done, as far as I know, in my lifetime."

When Corbett was running for governor in 2010, his campaign received $100,000 from Richard M. Scaife, owner of Trib Total Media, according to state campaign-finance reports.

Trib Total Media also was a "platinum" donor to Corbett's 2011 inaugural ball, meaning it gave between $15,000 and $25,000.