Last week this blog revealed that the process for recommending a successor to the late John Murtha in the 12th Congressional District was being rigged for Mark Critz. Instead of the members of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party from the District voting Gov. Rendell expanded the roll by another 50 delegates chosen by county chairs with the understanding, according to Mr. Critz, that he would receive their votes. We know that because Mark Critz told PoliticsPA last weekend he had those 50 votes sewn up. Since the actual people who would be casting those votes had yet to be determined the fix was in. Today's vote confirms that: state committee people voted 16-16 between Critz and Barbara Hafer while the extra people voted 30-7 for Critz. The deciding votes were those the Governor and County Chairs stacked the deck with to rig the process.
Of course stacking the deck is a time honored political back room dirty trick. Using the process to determine who will run for Congress in a District infamous for its corruption is quite unseemly. I suppose the people in the 12th Congressional District are so immune to corrupt politics at this point they don't care what happens. It is up to those of us in the remainder of the state to protest this operation and its selection of someone who helped defraud us all in his role at Parkins Inc.
The process now moves to the State Committee Executive Committee where someone must stand up for integrity. Today was a huge black eye for Pennsylvania Democrats.
