Bucks
Pennridge Quakertown Football, Fitzpatrick Morlok Letter
Dear Friends,
Good morning. Today, I thought I’d write about my cystoscopy experience but I’ll wait a few weeks to let the dust settle. My story is not for the faint of heart but it does have its humorous moments. Here’s a hint: what do the following have in common…Dr. Guzzo, Wazoo, and Kazoo?
Let me start with Michael Fitzpatrick who’ll return to congress in January after a four-year detour. Fitzpatrick lost to Patrick Murphy in 2006 but roared back this year, riding the wave of anger and frustration. Just as America voiced its disapproval of President George W. Bush at the 2006-midterm elections, voters unleashed their fury with President Obama, ousting 62 Democratic congressmen.
“Four years after losing his job and winning a battle with colon cancer, Fitzpatrick has the rare opportunity of a second chance,” one newspaper reported.
Last week, Fitzpatrick listed five priorities when he returns to Washington: (1) make existing tax rates permanent; (2) repeal certain provisions of the new health care reform law; (3) roll back spending to 2008 pre-stimulus levels; (4) an across the board reduction in the federal work force, except the military; and (5) eliminate congressional pensions.
That won’t be easy.
Fitzpatrick says that he won’t continue for more than four terms including his first one. So he won’t serve for more than six years. I particularly liked his desire to end congressional pensions and look forward to reading his bill to introduce that change. Eliminating congressional pensions would change the Washington mindset.
Unfortunately, getting a majority of the 435 House of Representative members to voluntarily give up their pensions has as much chance of seeing the light of day as having them impose term limits.
Item.
The Pennridge Quakertown football rivalry continued last week with a Pennridge victory, 22 to 12. Statisticians claim that Pennridge leads the series, 50 to 26 with five ties. That’s according to the record beginning in 1930. In those days, Pennridge was known as Sell-Perk, short for Sellersville and Perkasie.
But the rivalry between Quakertown and the folks below the Ridge Road goes back further. My father (Charles Jr.), his brother (John), and family friend and neighbor J. Lawrence “Jake” Grim played on the Perkasie squad that beat Quakertown in 1921. My Quakertown classmate friend, Bill Dietz, has a connection to that game as well. His father played against my father at the November 1921 classic. I don’t know how much earlier that the Quakertown Perkasie battles were fought but it may be approaching 100 years.
Item
In one of my recent ramblings, I was critical of the News Corporation’s support of Republican candidates. I received an unhappy response from one of my readers, Frederick Morlok from Doylestown.
“Over the last 10 years, News Corp was the 79th largest political contributor,” Mr. Morlok began. “They contributed $11 million of which 58 percent went to Democrats and 41 percent went to Republicans. During the same period ACT Blue spent $43 million and 99 percent went to Democrats. The American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees spent $43 million during that time period and 98 percent went to democrats. What Fox News who is part of News Corp spent on Republicans is chump change. You are focusing on the bottom end of the Paredo.
“The reason you spoke about in your column was the overwhelming support for the Republican candidate,” Morlok continued. “There was more to it than old white blue collar southerners. Only the liberal elite coastal states who, by the way are nearing bankruptcy, voted Democratic. The fear you spoke about was that Nancy Perlosi would some how manage to remain as Speaker of the House [of Representatives]. You give Americans no credit for being able to make the necessary changes to right this floundering nation. I think history will prove you wrong and the recent election is just the first step.”
Mr. Morlok writes a good letter. I don’t agree with him but we’ll see how the American public reacts to the next two years. My bet is that voters will begin to realize that the courageous stance that President Obama took in his first year in office will bear fruit. As American industry becomes more profitable, voters will see the unemployment numbers improve. They will also begin to understand the positive changes in the health care debate. And they will finally get the message that the Bush years, and their weak financial regulations, is what got us into the mess in the first place.
Next week, I’ll give you my thoughts about New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s appointment of Cathleen Black to run America’s largest public school. I know Cathy Black. While she has no public school experience, she is a no-nonsense corporate executive with a superb track record. Do we need people from the corporate world running our public schools?
Stay tuned.
Sincerely,
Charles Meredith