Every day, some bureaucratic government group blows a few million too much…..on a program, a dumb idea, a failing project, or yes, even on their own pay raises. The public is “ripped up” for awhile, being again reminded of the fiscal irresponsibility, the fatness of government agencies, and the desperate struggle for each group to justify why they should continue to sit at the office desk each day. But it always blows over, because citizens have greater things to worry about: the roof is leaking, the wife’s car needs new tires, and the husband’s boss just told him that there is going to be a layoff next month. Any one of these problems may be all that your monthly budget can bear, and so in focusing on our own realities, the “unreality show” in Harrisburg soon takes a back seat in the thoughts of the day.

There is a larger travesty taking place with this pocket-filling that stinks worse than the dead groundhog your neighbor left lying in the fencerow. And the opportunity for corrupt actions as a result of these raises looms fierce before the faces of lead politicians.

It is the House Minority Leader’s responsibility to oversee the assignment of committee leadership positions. These positions often provide additional power to a legislator, giving him the opportunity to push his/her own agenda forward with more tenacity. It also comes with a significant salary increase. After the vote was tallied for the salary hike, a number of committee leadership positions went through a major shuffle. Fifteen House Democrats were stripped of their committee leadership positions (12 subcommittee chairmen and 3 committee vice chairmen)– AND their pay for those positions. Quite coincidentally, ALL 15 DEMOCRATS that received these demotions were members who had voted against the pay raises!

To borrow Mr. Grogan’s line, “oil on ice doesn’t get this slimy.”

When questioned about the event, DeWeese’s spokesman said it was just a “shuffling of positions” and that the reassignments were purely coincidental. The spokesman said that Mr. DeWeese has the discretion to act as he sees fit.

Wow. We’re not sure if that is really “seeing fit”. It appears more to be “taking a fit”.

All of this brings us back to those bright young people that congressional leaders are trying to attract. Well, if you’re greedy, and you can play dirty, then politics might be in the cards. But the lesson here is to follow the leader, or be assigned to choosing paint colors for the state’s sign posts. Now that sounds like representative government at its finest.