Pornsylvania, where politics is hard-core

IT JUST never ends.

The state that was the keystone of colonies, the cradle of Democracy, a lofty leader for what's good and right just keeps finding ways to degrade itself.

And I'm not talking bond ratings. I'm talking X-ratings.

As you may have heard, the governor, the chief justice of the Supreme Court and the attorney general are embroiled in a porn scandal.

The guv and chief want more details (snicker, snicker) on what the A.G. has regarding who used government computers to send, swap or watch sexually explicit videos and images.

Sounds like a case of your public servants being hard at work.

A.G. Kathleen Kane last week offered samples of smut apparently shared by top prosecutors, state officials and maybe even judges during office hours over a four-year period, 2008-12.

Was the source of this salacious info, you know, a Deep Throat?

Nope. It came to light during Kane's investigation of Gov. Corbett's handling, as A.G., of the Jerry Sandusky scandal, another proud Pennsylvania moment.

The naughty bits were among millions of deleted emails recovered in Kane's probe and tied to eight former or current Corbett employees, all men, including two Cabinet members, State Police Commissioner Frank Noonan and state Environmental Secretary Chris Abruzzo.

The stuff recovered includes: posters of women in offices sexually servicing male bosses; a woman on a third date with a bowling pin; a video of a woman's vagina, titled "Golf Ball Washer."

Try to get that image out of your mind.

Dozens of other individuals apparently were in the loop for hundreds of such emails but not named by Kane, whose office cites ongoing investigations or union rules.

It can surprise no one that people watch porn. It can surprise no one that some watch at work.

It's not a crime, although it violates Attorney General's Office policy and, face it, many private-sector workers would be canned for such a violation.

In public jobs, there's variety. In 2008, nine District of Columbia workers were fired for watching an "egregious" amount of porn at work.

But this year, a high-level federal Environmental Protection Agency employee remains salaried after caught spending up to six hours a day watching porn on his government computer.

Hey, maybe his job is finding polluted websites.

The Kane case, though, is fraught with hard-core politics.

Remember, absent her Sandusky probe - a campaign promise that helped Kane become the first woman and first Democrat elected A.G. - these emails never surface.

Remember, Sandusky's prosecutors were infuriated that Kane questioned their work, and possibly feared she'd uncover this embarrassing cache.

So we're left to ponder.

Were leaks back in March, about Kane not prosecuting a sting case involving Philly Democrats taped taking cash, retaliation for going after Sandusky's prosecutors?

Is Kane now releasing only some names of possible pornophiles as retaliation for leaks about the sting case?

The fact that this comes just weeks before Corbett faces voters in a re-election effort already hampered by his connections to Sandusky is fodder for those who think Kane's playing the politics of personal protection.

The fact that it comes at all seems to support Kane's contention that much of public Pennsylvania is a good-ol'-boys network where women aren't welcome - except as testosterone targets.

I suppose the porn thing could be fixed by allowing contracts for Web content-management tools to prevent access to certain sites.

But that would probably just lead to bid-rigging.

Nobody looks good here. Not our government, not our politics, not our elected or appointed officials.

I mean, seriously. It just never ends.

Blog: ph.ly/BaerGrowls

Columns: ph.ly/JohnBaer