Press Enterprise from Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania • A10

By MATTHEW J. BROUILLETTE I like a recurring bad dream. A new year, a new turnpike toll hike. Now, driving the length of the highway costs upwards of $65.70 not counting the return trip. Only, this nightmare is real.

We know the usual suspects: infrastructure needs, mandates that the turnpike fund mass transit, the vague But high time Pennsylvanians get the full story. A good deal rejected In 2006, the Pennsylvania Funding and Reform Commission, created by then-governor Ed Rendell, recommended leasing the turnpike as part of a public-private partnership, which promised to reap billions in upfront infrastructure revenue, transfer risk to a private operator, improve road performance measures, and limit toll increases. Sounds like a real win-win policy solution. It was. But more powerful forces within the Capitol viewed proposal as an attack on their political and sinecures.

Indeed, multiple books have been written about the corruption and graft at the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC). From nepotism and rewarding political friends with lush jobs to spending tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars on lavish meals and European travel, the commission had become a tool for the politically powerful to exchange favors, hoard and live large off of toll-payers. Politically appointed commissioners opposed any efforts to bring in a private operator. And they knew where to turn to lobby lawmakers against it: Mike Long, a longtime Senate staffer-turned-lobbyist to whom many lawmakers owed their elections. Long had begun working in the Capitol in the mid-1970s.

Over the next several decades, he rose through the ranks to eventually become chief of staff to former Senate President Pro Tempore Bob Jubelirer. By 2005, his was so deep that political columnist John Micek, then of the Allentown Morning Call, wrote, every Republican Senate campaign since the mid-1980s bears his imprint in some Who better to persuade lawmakers to oppose the lease? The Turnpike Commission ironically, using toll revenues paid Long to convince his former colleagues to ignore the $12.8 billion bid that had come in to lease the turnpike for 75 years. And, by and large, ignore they did. When the lease offer expired, the bidders opted not to renew it, citing inaction on the part of the Legislature. Eventually, staff members who worked under Long while in the Senate got jobs at the Turnpike Commission.

The result: Pennsylvanians were stuck with the now-infamous Act 44, which authorized the turnpike to issue billions in new debt and increase tolls without limit and mandated that the PTC fund mass transit and other road projects to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars per year. Last year after releasing an audit report of the PTC, Auditor General Eugene DePasquale announced the current scenario adding that the increasing tolls are not only not putting a dent in the debt of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, but forcing less people to use the He concluded the turnpike is on the road to insolvency. What DePasquale mention is that as a state representative, he not only voted in favor of Act 44, which put the turnpike into the mess in, but also support leasing the turnpike. In May of 2008, the Chambersburg Public Opinion reported that DePasquale was concerned over allowing a to control major infrastructure and whether a foreign company should be (The bidder was the Spanish Abertis, a proven international leader in toll-road management.) Motorists pinched Now, 12 years later, not only did the state lose out on nearly $13 billion in up-front, non-tax revenue, but turnpike drivers are forking out upwards of $65 to traverse the state. And this number will go up again next year.

Under the proposed lease agreement, the maximum amount would have been $39.95 today a savings of over $50 for a border-to-border round trip. Sadly, drivers wake up to discover this was all a bad dream. But Pennsylvanians deserve the when that truth is how power, patronage, and politics triggered the turnpike rightfully outraged turnpike drivers for more than a decade. Matthew J. Brouillette is president and CEO of Commonwealth Partners Chamber of Entrepreneurs.

PINI NS NTERPRISE RESS NTERPRISE RESS Proud to be a family owned and operated newspaper since 1902 PUBLISHERS Paul R. Eyerly Sr. 1902-1946 Charles T. Vanderslice 1902-1957 Robert Eyerly 1957-1971 Paul R. Eyerly Jr.

1957-1979 BUSINESS EDITORIAL Paul R. Eyerly III Chairman Paul R. Eyerly IV President James T. Micklow Treasurer James P. Sachetti Editor Brandon R.

Eyerly Publisher Sarah Kile Advertising manager Donna Levan Circulation manager EDITORIAL I concerned about global warming or climate change or whatever the politically correct term for it is these days, you should be pleased by the most recent report card given to the Susquehanna Steam Electric Station near Berwick. Not only did the twin nuclear reactors set a plant record for power production last year, the folks responsible for operating them safely compiled a stellar record. For those of us who are neighbors to the plant, all of this is good news, of course. But also good news. Why? Because nuclear is the only proven technology for reliable, large-scale generation of power that produces zero climate-damaging emissions.

Zero. When Greta Thunberg, the child now celebrated as the conscience of planet Earth, spoke to the World Economic Forum in Switzerland last month, she told that gathering of leaders, want you to act as if the house is on because it Such calls for urgent action are a common theme among climate activists. Unfortunately, the development and adoption of new carbon-free technologies takes time. And if we were to heed the Thunbergian call for action by halting the extraction of coal, oil, gas, and so forth, the consequences wold be so economically disastrous that all work on new, alternative technologies would cease. However, if what the world needs now is urgent action, what we should be doing is moving construction of new nuclear plants to the top of our national to-do list.

But not happening. In fact, aging nuclear plants are being shut down; new plants to replace that lost capacity are nowhere on the horizon. When it comes to understanding the critical role nuclear power could play in reducing contribution to global warming, Americans are tively in the dark. Exhibits A and are Democratic presidential hopefuls Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Both claim to be pro-Green and anti-warming, yet both are opposed to nuclear power.

It makes no sense. According to Susquehanna Nuclear, the Talen Energy Corp. subsidiary that operates the local plant, the twin reactors produced 20,919,285 net megawatt hours of electricity in 2019. The company says enough to power over two million homes, with say it again emissions. The reason most often cited for lack of interest in nuclear construction is cost; reactors are very expensive, which makes it much more for energy companies to attract the necessary levels of investment.

This is the price we pay for fear. If there were a clue that went like this, Mile Island, Chernobyl, of those watching at home would shout at their TVs, are nuclear power plant What we fear, we guard against. This is why we have a Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and why its approval process for new plants looks like something drawn up by Rube Goldberg. Every line and box on the chart is a high hurdle that power companies must clear. Dan Bosch of the American Action Forum has studied the economics of this issue and arrived at a couple of conclusions: tal Policy Act regulations in order to make nuclear power more economically viable.

A recent proposal from the Trump Council on Environmental Quality offers the agency a chance to do so. deadlines within the environmental review process, adhering to page limits, and limiting the development of alternative scenarios. Others have argued that the NRC should thoroughly review and approve one reactor design that could be used all over the country. This, too, would lower the cost of new plants by speeding the approval process. If climate change truly is a crisis, as many believe, any or all ideas for getting new reactors up and running should be tried.

Nuclear fears cost planet Earth dearly energy spurned THE VIEW FROM WASHINGTON THEIR OWN WORDS SHARE A LAUGH LETTER By OU LA HOLT Z- EA I arkets tanked across the world in response to further news about the spread and severity of the coronavirus. In many ways it was eerily similar to December 2018 or June 2019, when equity markets reacted strongly to news about developments in the trade war. This makes sense, because a pandemic is much like a trade war, only potentially much worse. Both interfere, with retail trade; tariffs and quotas make consumers shift away from traded goods. The incentives to or even government-imposed quarantines interfere with trade as well.

People literally have less ability to interact to make transactions, and trade diminishes. In the 21st century, a second channel arose: the supply chain. The impact of tariffs on the supply chain is the new element of trade wars. While the research verdict is not yet in, the impacts appear to be substantial. Supply-chain trades ampli the tariff impacts and produced tremendous uncertainty about the scale and location of business investments.

The economy faltered. Similarly, the coronavirus has closed facilities in China and elsewhere, and thus it is a threat to international supply chains. So coronavirus is a lot like a trade the trade war damage was real and so far the market response to the coronavirus is about fear. Growth in gross domestic product (GDP) was 2.3 percent between the fourth quarter 2018 and one year later. Most analysts put the downdraft from idling the Boeing 737 Max production (and its supply chains) at about 0.5 percentage points.

That puts us in the vicinity of 1.5 percent or so. With a big coronavirus impact, one could not rule out a number near zero. Yet the Atlanta Fed GDPNow tracker puts the current growth estimate at 2.6 percent, while the New York Fed Nowcast is at 2.0 (and rising recently). The U.S. economy proved to be very resilient in the face of the trade war.

It is too soon to write it off as a result of the coronavirus. Stock market vu entrust U.S. to Democrats Turnpike hikes rooted in corruption The Democratic Party and its fellow travelers have been trying for more than four years to politically assassinate President Donald Trump. Let us count their failed attempts: target of an extra-judicial coup attempt orchestrated by the Obama Administration. him in supported with FISA court warrants obtained under false pretenses.

by a special prosecutor, which ultimately cleared the president. immediately pivoted to impeachment, which failed. Throughout all this, the political and societal disturbances caused by this Democratic vendetta against Trump have essentially prevented our constitutional republic from functioning as designed. Still, despite having failed multiple times at political assassination, Democratic Party leaders now seem willing to say or do almost anything to tarnish the president and those who support him. Trump has been called illegitimate; been accused of winning only because of voter fraud, and his voters have been derided as uneducated, racist, white nationalists and other haters.

not claiming this steady media drumbeat against Trump and his supporters has caused violence, but the reality is, there have been many violent attacks on Trump supporters, and most of those attacks have been given scant or no news coverage by the mainstream media. The Democratic Party of my parents sought power by building coalitions of voting blocs from across all of American culture. The Democratic Party of today is being driven by its radical left fringe members. The political tool bag of this new party contains weapons such as social and institutional ostracism; intellectual violence against Trump supporters, and the censorship of opposing views by most social media platforms. The mainstream media have been reduced to the propaganda arm of the Democrats and associated anti-Trump forces.

They present the news as a one-sided attack on anything Trump, while ignoring his accomplishments. wager that few of you reading this letter are aware President Trump recently appointed an openly gay member of the LGBTQ community to a cabinet level position. This would have been big news had this appointment been made by anyone but Trump. If the Democrats take total control of our government this November, I predict they will not govern as moderates. In January 2021, with Washington under their control, likely they will advance laws to pack the Supreme Court with far-left-leaning activist judges.

The emboldened Democrats would move to dismantle the Electoral College, guaranteeing that all presidents in the foreseeable future would be elected by the coastal elites in places like New York and California. Those picking our future presidents by bypassing the Electoral College would be the same coastal elites who refuse to this day to accept the legitimacy of election. These are the same folks who smugly refer to the regions of America that elected him as The same elitist voters cannot understand why anyone would want to live somewhere they snobbishly refer to as middle of They stereotype the majority of heartland Americans as too white, and neither very smart nor talented. To bring it closer to home, doubtful they have anything good to say about those of us down here in Columbia County as they over us in jets powered by the fossil fuels they rail against. A Democratic Party funded by the elites and invigorated by a November victory would pass a feel-good which history has shown never achieves its intended goals.

Under the guise of saving the environment, they would pass laws and enact regulations that would hijack and wreck the American economy for the purpose of raising the taxes needed to enact their Green New Deal, all the while claiming they are saving the world. I urge you all: Do not let this happen. MICHAEL J. BOWER Bloomsburg NTERPRISE RESS Bliss 10 Press Enterprise Thursday, February 27, 2020 Why men wear earrings id you ever wonder why earrings became so popular with men? A man is at work one day when he notices his co-worker is wearing an earring. The man knows his co-worker to be a normally conservative fellow and is curious about his sudden change in The man walks up to him and says, know you were into make such a big deal, only an he replies sheepishly.

His friend falls silent for a few minutes, but then his curiosity prods him to ask, how long have you been wearing since my wife found it in my mistake has been made, but up to us to rectify these COUN ILWOMAN JANE RAY OULD As Lincoln City Council voted 5-2 to pay a landlord more than $950 to repair an apartment door police busted through in error.