Week in Review: Onorato Gains Momentum, Corbett Digs Himself Deeper on Economic and Budget Issues
 
While Dan Onorato demonstrated a solid grasp of Pennsylvania’s challenges at the first general election debate and polls showed the race significantly tightening, Tom Corbett’s inexperience was on full display, and he actually proposed hitting workers with a multibillion-dollar tax increase.
 
Multiple Polls Show Tighter Race and Momentum for Onorato“For the first time in the general-election campaign, the Pennsylvania gubernatorial race between Republican Tom Corbett and Democrat Dan Onorato is too close to call, according to a poll released Wednesday.” [Associated Press, 9/29/10]

Several polls were released during the week showing Onorato cutting Corbett’s lead to single digits.  The Franklin & Marshall College Poll released on Wednesday put the race at 41% to 37% among likely voters – a 4-point gap – with 19% undecided. The poll showed a major tightening, with the last month’s F&M Poll indicating an 11-point gap. Earlier in the week, a survey by Susquehanna Polling & Research showed a 6-point gap – compared to a 15-point difference in that firm’s March poll.  And a Suffolk University Poll released Wednesday similarly showed the race at 7 points.
 
“Critics who scoffed at Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dan Onorato’s decision to use television commercials to tell voters how to pronounce his name might want to hold their tongues.” [Patriot News. 9/29/10]
 
Corbett Promises Business Audience He’ll Make Workers – Not Big Business – Bail Out the Unemployment DebtDuring the first general election debate on Monday, Corbett advocated increasing workers’ payroll taxes by $3 billion to repay Pennsylvania’s unemployment debt to the federal government.  Specifically, Corbett said, “I would look at the payroll tax – increasing the payroll contributions.  I would look at reducing the unemployment if necessary, if we get to that point.”
 
Corbett’s proposed tax hike on workers comes after his earlier attack on Pennsylvania’s hard-working families.
 
In March, Corbett visited a career center and “provocatively suggested that Congress’ decision to extend unemployment benefits might be having the opposite of its intended effect and actually be serving as a disincentive to go back to work. ‘What I see here are people looking for jobs, but that’s only 10 percent [of the unemployed],’ he said. ‘What about the other 80 or 90 percent?’” (Capitol Ideas, 3/18/2010)
 
And this summer, Corbett said “the jobs are there” but the unemployed would rather just “sit there” and collect unemployment benefits. (WITF, 7/9/2010)
 
Now Corbett wants to increase taxes on workers while they have a job, and potentially cut their unemployment benefits if they lose one.
 
Corbett Admits That He Doesn’t Know What He’s Talking AboutOn Monday, making workers pay an extra $3 billion to the unemployment compensation fund was a “payroll tax” – at least according to Tom Corbett at the gubernatorial debate.
 
But by Thursday, Corbett’s spokesman Kevin Harley argued that the payroll deduction is a “contribution” because the money goes into a dedicated fund that workers benefit from if they wind up unemployed — and not toward general government operations.” (Patriot-News, 10/1/10)
 
So, just like the gas tax?
 
And Tom Corbett’s ongoing struggle to understand the state budget crisis hit another rough patch on Thursday when Corbett deviated from the controlled environments he prefers and appeared before the Patriot-News editorial board.  Corbett demonstrated yet again that when it comes to Pennsylvania’s fiscal problems, he simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about – a fact he essentially admitted in the interview. 
Corbett told the Patriot-News that budget cuts “could well be directed back to programs that the people of Pennsylvania have become accustomed to” but “he has not yet looked at the state budget or spoken to legislative leaders in detail about what programs might be on the chopping block.” [Patriot News, 9/29/2010]

Corbett also suggested cutting one state agency, but he couldn’t think of a single wasteful program in that agency. Pressed by the Patriot-News on whether some state cuts might result in local property tax hikes, Corbett  demurred, saying that, “how state and local officials handle issues of shifting program costs would depend on the individual program. ‘You work at it the best you possibly can.’”  

OVERVIEW OF COVERAGE
 
Poll shows tightened race for Pa. governor
By Tom Infield, Philadelphia Inquirer, September 30, 2010
          Democrat Dan Onorato had been saying that his campaign’s polls showed him trailing narrowly in the Pennsylvania governor’s race, not by the 10 points or even 15 points that published polls had shown. Now comes a respected independent poll that may back up Onorato’s assertion.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/local/20100930_Poll_shows_tightened_race_for_Pa__governor.html#ixzz110pT1Dii
 
 
A life-long Pennsylvanian, Dan Onorato was raised in a working class neighborhood on Pittsburgh’s North Side. He graduated college from Penn State and received his law degree from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. Onorato has served as Allegheny County Executive since 2004 and was unopposed for re-election in 2007.  Prior to being elected County Executive, Onorato served as Allegheny County Controller and a Pittsburgh City Councilman.  Dan and his wife Shelly reside in the Brighton Heights neighborhood of Pittsburgh with their three children.
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