Hardly working

A Central Pennsylvania television station recently calculated that the Pennsylvania Legislature is burning through $50,000 a day in taxpayer money every day it convenes since the June 30 fiscal year deadline.

And what is the most expensive state legislature in the country doing with its time (other than debating the budget, of course)?

From an editorial in today's edition of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

Legislative 'priorities'

Pennsylvanians can take comfort in knowing that while their elected representatives couldn't cobble together a cohesive state budget by deadline, they nevertheless were dutifully at work attending to pressing public matters.

Among some lawmakers' priorities: a resolution on the Borough of Dushore's 150th anniversary and legislation on county park police training requirements.

Then there's that crucial legislation from Rep. Babette Josephs, D-Philadelphia, which bans the forced implantation of computer chips in humans. What a relief!

Maybe this crew should draft legislation banning the replacement of state representatives with cyborgs. With regard to some, it's difficult to differentiate the human beings -- those capable of intelligent problem-solving -- from what appear to be preprogrammed robots at work on the assembly line at the Susquehanna Sausage Factory.

Now, it doesn't require an awful lot of intelligence, artificial or otherwise, to figure out that a growing multibillion-dollar state deficit, looming for months, would demand considerably more focus in state budgeting this year. And yet, once again, the clock ran out without a fiscal accord in hand.

Thus began the backroom dealing, with Gov. Ed Rendell's 16 percent income-tax hike in the balance. And, ultimately, the adoption of a state budget that will be handed to the public as a done deal.

This, sadly, is what passes in Pennsylvania as "representative government."