Junior's Achievement:

HA: By everything we've ever heard about you, you're a very nice, decent individual. Why go negative? Why maintain that sort of negativity on the airwaves?

BC: Well, one thing which we did early in the campaign is we started off by spending a lot of money, I don't know what the number was, but it was probably well into the millions, talking about our record as auditor general, the things that we did on trying to help nursing homes to be safer for older Pennsylvanians, to make sure that child care is more affordable and that government is a lot more accountable on every level. We've got a great record to talk about. We can talk about it in more detail later. And also talking about my proposal to fight for an increase in the minimum wage, our proposal to expand health insurance in Pennsylvania, especially for the unemployed, using tobacco settlement dollars. And we laid out a lot of those, not just policy positions but our record in the television [ads]. And then there comes the point in the campaign where you have to engage. And we thought we had to engage Ed [Rendell] on his education record because he had already been on the air in Pittsburgh saying how great it was and leading to believe, really misleading people to believe, that, because he had done a good job as mayor of Philadelphia on the issue of education, therefore, in the second 15 seconds of his ad, therefore they should believe that he'll do a good job for Pennsylvania, which has been the premise of his whole campaign, and then reduce class size, get more dollars into the school districts and all the rest. So we put an ad on the air that laid out the Rendell record, which was the school district is in debt after he left, the district receives less [now] ... two years after he had served eight years being the only mayor in the state that has the power to impact a school district. And also the test scores were in the bottom one percent. And then, of course, he responds to that, and then a couple of weeks later, even though he said he was only engaged in responsive advertising, he put an ad on the air that says he had this great crime-fighting record and I had no record and I never put anybody in jail or whatever else. And then, of course, we responded to that. So it's a lot of back and forth.

BC: Oh, sure. Tell them to give you a list of things that they've called me. I mean, I thought it was interesting that the first ad that he ran in this television market at a high level, I think in February and March and April he was running a low level of television here, almost none but a little bit. But the first serious television buy that he did was last weekend, or maybe just a little bit prior to last weekend, of about a couple hundred thousand dollars just for this market over a couple-day period of time. The first ad he ran was an ad which said that, quote, newspapers say that Bob Casey is lying about Ed Rendell's record. Beware, voters in Philadelphia, suburbs and the Lehigh Valley, beware; he's coming to your town. But the first thing he said in that ad was that newspapers were saying that I was lying, which I think even the newspaper which I think he might have been quoting from would dispute.

BC: I'm not sure, because I'm not sure I know the cite [citation], because I'm not sure there's a cite on the screen. I won't speculate, but I think I know which one because I was there recently and they disputed what he said. But then the ad ends with a reference to, quote, Harrisburg reporters say -- again, hiding behind the cloak of someone else. No, "Even Harrisburg reporters say he wouldn't be running if his name wasn't Casey.' Now, a couple weeks earlier they had an ad on the air in Pittsburgh, actually in more than Pittsburgh, it was throughout the whole state, which said that, you know, they compare the two of us. Rendell's experience, they list a couple things, Casey, no experience. So if you're elected twice statewide and do the job we've done, you have no experience?

So I think there's been a lot of back and forth and I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing for voters. I think voters want to have a vigorous debate, a lot of exchanges between the candidates. They want your record to be tested against a lot of scrutiny; they want your policy positions to be tested under a lot of pressure and scrutiny. And they want you to be tested, because part of this process is deciding who's going to be, who may be, the governor of Pennsylvania, but certainly who's going to be the nominee of the party. You're getting down to two people in the general election who will have a chance to be governor. So I think people expect a ton of scrutiny about your record and about who you are, and I guess that's part of it.

BC: I think there's always a level of frustration that voters feel when they perceive that there's too much back and forth, too much discussion about the other guy, and I understand that, but I think that happens a lot in our campaign. I think if you look at Pennsylvania history -- even the recent history, I'm not talking about 50 years now, I'm talking about the last 10 years or 15 years -- I don't think this campaign has reached a level of negativity that's unprecedented. I really don't. I think there's been a lot of back-and-forth, but I don't think it's been a lot different from a lot of the statewide campaigns that I've seen. But I think at the end of the day people are able to process a lot more than a lot of us give them credit for. They're able to digest the back-and-forth, the charges back and forth, and they get a sense of the record of both candidates, they get a sense of who you are.

DG: Have voters said, you know, tone it down or go kick his butt? What have you heard about the negativity of the campaign?

BC: You hear both. You hear both. You hear some people saying, "Boy, I've seen a lot of the ads back and forth against you or against him, and I wish we didn't have to see as much as we do.' And then you get some people who say, "You gotta make sure you spend more time on his record.' And they give you all kinds of advice and suggestions. But I think, in the end, they're able to get -- There's an interest level in this campaign that I have never seen before in a primary, and that's a good thing because that will lead to more interest in the coverage, the consuming of the coverage, and a higher voter turnout.

DG: Don't you think the amount of throat-cutting in the campaign kind of weakens the eventual winner for [Republican candidate and state Attorney General] Mike Fisher?

BC: Some people have made that argument. I don't think that that's going to happen. I really don't. I base that upon a lot of history. This is really my fourth statewide race. I had a very rough primary in 1996 for auditor general, then I had two general elections on top of that. I worked very hard in the '86 campaign for governor. My father ran against Ed Rendell. It was a very tough primary. In many ways, the ads were tougher that year. People don't remember, but they were real tough ads. But that was a tough primary, which ended up being a big deficit at the end, at the end of the race. But it was a very tough primary, both sides spent over two-and-a-half-million dollars, which doesn't sound like much now but was a record then for a combined primary. And the party came together that year and beat a candidate who, you could make a strong argument, was a lot tougher than Mike Fisher. Someone --[Bill] Scranton, who had a lot more name identification; he was a statewide name. He was coming off a very popular administration. He was a very hard guy to beat and the party came together. There are plenty of examples where this state has had a lot of tough primaries and then come together. In fact, the history shows, if you look at it, that the party with the tough primary usually wins.

HA: Back in the beginning of the campaign, [state] Senator Vince Fumo said that if Ed didn't get out, he would take him out. How? And do you stand by that? How was he gonna take him out, what was he gonna say?

BC: I don't know; you'd have to ask Vince. I've known him a long time and never heard him make that kind of an assertion. I don't know what he meant by that. I think, you know, I can only speculate. I think what --

BC: Well, I think what a lot of people do in a campaign is -- I mean, if you're really going to be a supporter of someone, you don't just say, "You know, I think I'll support this person or that person, and I might make a contribution.' You try to help at every level. And he's done that. He's been enormously helpful on developing support for us in the city -- he's helped us raise money, he's helped us on issue development, on trying to find better ways to spend dollars in the state budget for education, a whole series of things. He was just doing it the other day. Beating the Republicans over the head on the Senate floor. That's what I think he and I and anyone else means when they say they're going to work hard for one candidate.

BC: Well, hopefully [it means] work hard enough for your candidate that the other candidate loses.

DG: But in South Philly, where Vince Fumo's from, and many of us live, "I'm gonna take you out' is pretty doggone clear. And it usually doesn't mean "I'm gonna work hard for this one guy.'

BC: I think the record shows in the campaign so far that that's all it's meant. 'Cause that's all -- He's worked very hard for us.

BC: Oh, I think there's no question that I have a much better chance of winning the general election, because I'm the only candidate in the race who's won statewide twice. And I've won by big margins. In fact, despite the fact that I don't think I'll carry the City of Philadelphia in the primary, we've done very well here. In fact, when I ran in 2000, I got 83 percent of the vote in this city. No candidate ever -- other than, I think, [City Controller] Jonathan Saidel, not both of our recent presidential candidates, not Ed Rendell -- no candidate ever has gotten 83 percent of the vote in the City of Philadelphia. And I'm proud of that, but I'm also aware that it happened because a lot of people in this town pulled hard for us. And I also got a higher vote in the Philadelphia suburbs than either President Clinton or Al Gore, in terms of the margin. So I think I've demonstrated statewide that I can win in the Eastern part of the state in a big way, but also that I can carry Western Pennsylvania.

HA: In terms of people having this perception, at least in Philadelphia, that we're not well-liked in the rest of the state. I was wondering, why is that and what is your perception of that?

BC: I think there's always a certain amount of unease about major urban areas when you have a big state. I think it happens in New York state, with New York City; I think it's natural.

BC: Well, I think there's always a perception that the bigger city gets more funding. Even if it's not accurate. I don't think that that's as intense or as pervasive as people think, that attitude. Some of it's being borne out right now. You're in a primary election, where two candidates are running, and Ed Rendell will get a lot of votes outside of Philadelphia. I think that'll be clear on Election Day. I just don't think that perception's as widespread as people think.

DG: For the past almost 30 years, in the vast majority of Pennsylvania races, there has been a guy named Bob Casey on the ballot. Either you or your dad.

DG: A few others! ... But there's always a Bob Casey. Is that familiarity part of your advantage, and is that part of why the Republicans are afraid? I mean, voters vote for the familiar. ... How much of an advantage does that give you?

BC: It's a huge advantage, and it's helped me in every race I've been in. And I'm not only proud of it, but I'm grateful that I have that kind of an advantage. But an advantage like that only gets you so far down the track, especially for governor. I mean, if all this was was a familiarity contest where people were more familiar with one name than another, then this race would have been over in January.

DG: Where are you going to take us as a state? OK, the first 100 days of Bob Casey's administration, what's the first legislation you sign, who are the first people you hire -- what's the first thing you do?

BC: Well, I would hope that on day one we'd have most of or all of the cabinet in place and senior staff and appointments done, but in terms of an agenda, the first thing we've got to do is focus on some of the basic challenges the state faces, the obligations that the state has. If you look at the state budget, it's mostly about education and health care of all different varieties and levels. We have 1.2 million people in the state with no health care at all, a quarter of a million of them are children. Since the recession began in March 2001, we've had 120,000 people in the state lose their jobs, in many cases losing their health insurance. What I want to do immediately is use tobacco-settlement dollars and get legislation passed immediately to use tobacco-settlement dollars to target health-care coverage for the unemployed and their children. We can cover even above the Ridge-Schweiker plan, which should be in effect in July. Even above those levels, another 90,000 people, including children of unemployed workers. That's one of the first things I do. The second thing I do is -- well, not the second but at that same level -- is begin the process of renewing the state's commitment to public education, which hasn't been there for this administration. And the way you do that is by starting with your state budget in February, where the governor of Pennsylvania has enormous power to say, "This year the state of Pennsylvania is going to spend X on basic education, on special education and all the other parts on aid to public schools.' Right now, that number, if you add up all the dollars for K through 12 education, is about 33 percent. At the same time, we've given away $5 billion in corporate tax cuts and we have record spending for the governor's office and all these other agencies, and education is down here at the bottom. So I'd want to specifically focus on education in the first budget by saying, "This year we're going to spend X dollars, which is a lot more of an investment than the Ridge administration.' Also, I think we can start very quickly in rescuing the PACE [Pharmaceutical Assistance Contract for the Elderly] program and the lottery. Because if we do nothing for the next couple of years, what used to be a traditional surplus will be almost a half-a-billion-dollar deficit, so we've got to start that right away. Also the early-learning initiatives that we put forth in the campaign, which involves $10 million of new spending, with collapsing a lot of different programs, amounting to $55 million into an early-learning initiative so children get not only a healthy start in life but also a smart start. So I'd start immediately with a lot of those priorities.

JC: In this state, doctors have a particularly hard time. They're caught between lower reimbursements and soaring premiums, especially in the five-county area. Isn't tort reform a good idea?

BC: Well, it depends on what you mean. I'm not a supporter of -- and this is another area where Ed and I have some disagreements --I'm not a supporter of damage caps, and I'm not a supporter of playing games with joint- and severe-liability provisions because, first of all, I don't think they lead to the result, which is this wonderful malpractice reform that some think is out there. And two, and more importantly, really, than the first one, more importantly is they adversely impact workers. I don't think that the cost of lawsuits and damages and big verdicts has anything to do with the medical-malpractice challenge the state faces. What happened, in this recent debate there was legislation passed, they made some progress on more reporting of medical errors, they made some progress from the doctor's point of view and from the lawyer's point of view. But what was left out of that, in a way that's outrageous, was the insurance companies. The ones who have caused most of the problems were left out and really not held accountable. It was like a huge elephant in the room and they weren't taken on. So you have doctors and lawyers at each other's throats and you had some reform passed, but it didn't satisfy either side and the insurance companies weren't held accountable, with all those investments they were making. What you need is a governor who appoints an insurance commissioner who's going to be very tough in the oversight of the insurance companies. That's why in our patient-protection plan, which is actually a separate issue from the tort-reform discussions, in our health-care plan we commit to appointing a health-insurance advocate who would go before the insurance commissioner when the insurance companies come before the state, sometimes in the dark of night, and get their rate increases before anyone knows it happened.

HA: How much could this advocate say no? To say to the insurance companies, "No, you cannot get this?'

BC: Well, we'd have to work out the lines of authority, but at a minimum, there would be a record established as to why the rate increase isn't justified and, of course, the key thing here is having a governor who has consumers, not just on his mind, but has consumers as a priority when you appoint your insurance commissioner. One of the most powerful lobbies in Harrisburg in 2002 and for all of our lifetimes, and the lifetimes of our great-great grandparents, has been the insurance industry. They are very, very powerful. And if you don't have an insurance commissioner who's willing to fight those battles and take them on then the consumers will suffer, workers will suffer, and the health-care community will suffer.

HA: But would it be strictly advisory, or would it be something with teeth, saying that this is it, bottom line you cannot ...

BC: Oh, I'd like to make it with as much teeth as possible, but we'd need a lot of legal advice to get that kind of authority. I'd like it to be a real tough advocate who has a lot of authority to stop an exorbitant rate increase.

BC: I really don't. Part of it is I don't think it's appropriate to say to someone, "Hey, why don't you come on board,' before you're elected. The second thing is I'm a little superstitious, and right now I don't want to talk about anything beyond May 21st. And then I won't want to talk about anything beyond the first week in November.

DG: For the past couple of weeks you've been throwing hooks and uppercuts at Ed for his failure in the crisis in the Philadelphia public schools.

DG: When you become governor, that crisis will be thrown squarely into your lap. Now what do you do?

BC: Part of it is being a governor who renews the state's commitment to public education, which hasn't been there. I've said it before, I'll say it again. We've had an administration the last couple of years where the share for basic education was decreasing every year in a time of enormous prosperity across the country, and, as a result, record surpluses in Pennsylvania. At the same time that was going down, $5 billion in corporate tax cuts went out the door, and property taxes went through the roof. So there wasn't the commitment there that we should have had. This state really committed itself for big tax cuts for very big businesses, but there wasn't the same level of commitment [to schools]. There's also this long-running voucher debate in the state, and everyone in Harrisburg took their eye off the ball, the focus on public education. So you've got to have that commitment, first of all. You also have to spend the time and the energy in order to do that, and that means personal involvement of the governor in debates about public education, finding new money for public education, being an advocate for public education all across the state, including here in Philadelphia. I would argue that there's only one candidate in the race who already had a chance to do that. And I think Ed had not only a lot of years --eight years is a long time --but had enormous power to spend a lot more time and energy and resources on public education, and he didn't. And he failed. And don't just take my word for it, I mean, when he left office, the Philadelphia Inquirer made basically the same point. They said the city is suffering from a lot of problems, and they described the city as having a cancer when they wrote the editorial in January of 2000. And they said the root cause of the cancer is the problems in the public-school system, and that he didn't expend the energy on that challenge as he did on getting the Republican Convention here. Now, that's what the Inquirer said. So I think there's a lot of basis for the assertion that he didn't use the power that he had. Just the phenomenal power you have as mayor to influence public opinion, to spend a lot of time and effort and energy on a crisis like the schools. And also to use your relationship with the Republican governor, which to say was cozy was the understatement of the century. And he didn't use that relationship either. And when I challenge him on it, he turns to me and says, "Bob, I sued the state. What more did you want me to do?' Well, lawsuits are interesting, but that takes forever. It was the year-by-year budget battles that he wasn't engaged in. But, of course, in Pittsburgh, you would think that he was, when he went on the air out there and says, "I did a great job on education.' Then he comes to Philly and someone shoots at him and he says, "Oh, it wasn't my fault. It was the state. They did it.' But let me address the rest of your question. In terms of what happens in Philly, the most important thing the governor can do is renew that commitment to public education, which will have a very positive effect on the whole state, including Philly. But in this instance, you also have a serious obligation to closely monitor what's going on with this experiment. With the School Reform Commission, with the privatization, which I was vehemently opposed to at every level.

BC: Absolutely. But can we undo it? Probably not in the short run. So what you have to do is-- The Republicans made sure that the next governor, and I think they thought it might have been me, would have to deal with seven-year terms on that commission and a lot of other mechanisms to prevent the next governor from changing anything.

DB: You've explained your approach to the privatization effort currently under way and that the School Reform Commission has seven-year terms, so there's probably not much you can do about it if you became governor.

DB: How would you have dealt with it had you been in Governor Ridge's or Governor Schweiker's shoes when the Philadelphia schools had this budget crisis? What would you have asked them to do?

BC: First of all, Governor Ridge and Governor Schweiker didn't just land on the planet earth in 1999 or 2000. They had a lot of years before that to not only help a school district like Philadelphia, but a lot of school districts that are hurting. And what they didn't do was, first of all, make the investment of the state budget across the board, across the state into all 501 districts, that they should have made. They gave away $5 billion to businesses. And I think-- You want to talk about what you can do right now? This year, in this budget -- and here is where Ed and I disagree -- I think we should take the $91 million of the capital-stock and franchise-tax phase-out, which is half of what they wanted to phase out, they're giving a half a tax cut, I guess. That $91 million we should not give this year. We should use that $91 million for schools. Imagine this, 500 districts in the state get an increase of 1 percent [in their budgets], which is a total of $39.6 million that they've got to divvy up. ... You want to talk about creating division and creating hostility? That was created there. It's a basic difference between Ed and myself. I think we should do that. He said that we should continue the capital-stock and franchise-tax phase-out, quote, almost at all costs, unquote. So here's a situation where we can help schools right now with new money, taking that $91 million and dedicating it to schools, and also taking more money from the existing state budget and dedicate it to schools, and you don't hear them talking about that. ... I think Ed failed, and I think the current administration failed in those years. There's a lot of overlap between the Rendell mayoral years and the Ridge administration. A lot of years went by where public education just wasn't a priority. Ed's priority was Center City and Center City and Center City. He said he built 15 hotels when our people challenged him on his jobs record. That's why the mayor's race in 1999 was about two issues, neighborhoods and schools. Those were the only two issues debated in that campaign, for the most part.

BC: I don't think it's that stark a choice. I think there are times when a governor faces a budget deficit, as we're facing this year, and we'll face an even larger one next year, when you have to prioritize where the dollars are going to go and where your focus is. But I think that when you have a situation like you have this year, here you have $90 million that's going to go for a continuation of the tax cut, and you're over here saying there's just a 1 percent increase for schools, I think for me that's an easy choice. You can't even keep the lights on for 1 percent. You can't do that and be able to justify $90 million over here. I couldn't justify $5 billion in cuts, and Ed, I don't think he's ever criticized Governor Ridge about that. I've been criticizing him for years. When you have $5 billion in tax cuts which didn't move us down the job creation scale at all, and you're not making the commitment to public education.... One of the problems with some of his proposals, is A) you can't pay for the proposal. His "let's do it now, let's get to 50 percent right now' alleged plan costs $1.5 billion. But when you do the math on it, the only way he gets to $1.5 billion is a massive income-tax increase. Now, he might say that to an editorial board, but he doesn't say that on television, he denies it. We say it. "You're planning to raise the income tax.' "Oh, no. Casey has to stop saying that. That's only if nothing else works out.' But when you do the math, he can get $300 million from the cigarette-tax increase, that's probably achievable. The second part of his plan is slot-machine revenue. He says it's $550 [million]. The Penn State study says $191 [million], and that's the source. So he's got $200 million there, he's $300 [million] or so off. And then the next part of it is this crazy proposal that he has that he's going to save $750 million to $1 billion standing on his head. And then you analyze how he gets there, and it's cutting health benefits for state workers, renegotiating state leases, which won't add up to one-fifth of that, even if you were able to achieve it, which he won't be able to achieve. So I think he's about a billion short on his $1.5 billion plan, and the only thing that pays for it is a massive increase in the income tax, if you increase the income tax in a massive way, which you have to to fund his plan, you disadvantage working families in the state who have to pay that, you get corporations off the hook because they're not paying property taxes as a result of you getting rid of all the property taxes. You jeopardize local control of education, and you make your education system totally reliant upon two very volatile sources of revenue, either sales or income, and you have a situation like Michigan, in this tough economy, where their education system is based upon the sales tax, and they're cutting it this year by 3 percent. Cutting the education budget. Alabama is cutting their education budget. That's not the way to go. And I think his $1.5 billion alleged plan is fraudulent, and I think he's trying to disguise a massive tax increase which, in and of itself, in this context would be a mistake.

HA: Let's get back to education. We talked about dollars. How could they be spent to better education? What is the method?

BC: Good question, yeah. What hasn't happened in this, ever, is we've never had state dollars go to reduce class size, which all the data shows -- the Tennessee study, every study you can look at -- all the data shows that if you can reduce class size, you'll have a positive impact on kids. Especially, at least in the Tennessee study, especially on kids that live in urban areas, especially minority kids, can positively benefit from that in a way that's disproportionately positive in comparison to other kids. So we have to target dollars to reduce class size. Can we reduce class sizes as we want them to be reduced in one year? No. But I think we have to begin the process of committing dollars there.

HA: Would you support any legislation to give home-schooled parents more autonomy over their education?

BC: Well, because I think that in any kind of reform, whether charter schools or cyber-charter schools, any kind of reform, we have to live up to the obligation the state has, which is to make sure that every child gets what the state constitution calls a thorough and efficient education. I just think we have to look at it very carefully. I'm not sure what competing proposals are out there on that, but I think we've got to be careful.

DB: You mentioned how difficult it was to give those 35 children the attention they needed. What about when a woman gets pregnant and can't give a child the love and attention it needs, should she have to have the baby anyway?

BC: I think when you run for an office like governor, your record is not just subject to scrutiny, but it should be examined carefully. When people in this state examine my record, as opposed to Ed's record and as opposed to Mr. Fisher's record, on commitment to Affirmative Action and commitment to a diverse workforce and a commitment to doing everything possible in the job I have now to bring that about, I think I'll win that competition easily. We have a department of what is now 780 people. When we started it was much bigger [laughs] and it was reduced by a whole variety of reasons. The Republicans made sure it was reduced and we couldn't keep it as big as it was, but we have much smaller workforce even though our audit production is higher, which is another little commercial for our work. But, in the process of that department shrinking by 80 to 100 people, the percentages of minorities actually increased. Not enough yet, but it increased. We hired, I guess, by now, over 200 people, and 20 percent of our new hires were minorities. And our rate of increases in terms of promotions have been higher for minorities and women than they have for the rest of the workforce.

DG: How do you translate that into encouraging diversity in the workforce for the private sector? [Points at Altman] Are you going to tell him to hire more black writers?

BC: A lot of it is leading by example. But here is another way to look at it, in terms of capital. We have not just an audit, but a task force, on the minority- and women-business enterprise program and how to make it a lot better. And we pointed out problems left and right in that program run by the Ridge administration where, if they met their goal, and what they should have been doing, they would have given out 8 percent of contracts over a two-year period of time, which would have amounted to a half-billion dollars worth of contracts to minority- and women-owned firms, and they only gave half that. So $250 million that could have gone to minority- and women-owned firms didn't get there because this administration wasn't committed to doing that. One of the things we talked about, in addition to improving that program, which involves state contracts and public dollars, in the private market, when you have these massive venture-capital funds over here and state pension funds and the governor has a lot of authority over where that money is spent, billions of dollars, you should as governor, and I would as governor, work to make sure that the state pension fund invests in venture-capital funds that demonstrate that sensitivity and that sense of inclusion of minority- and women-owned firms. That is where, in terms of empowering people with capital, that is where it can happen. And a lot of those dollars, they should hold the venture-capital firms accountable for investing in emerging minority-owned firms. That is where you really move the bar.

HA: What is the balance between investing in minority-owned firms and the return on the dollar? Which end of the scale gets more weight under the Casey administration?

BC: Well, I think that you want to achieve both. I don't think they are necessarily mutually exclusive.

BC: You want to do everything possible to bring about a situation where those firms have more investment in them, but you don't want to do anything that is going to cause a return on investment which is, ah, you know, a dereliction of your duty. As governor, you have an obligation to make sure those funds are invested with as high a return as possible.

HA: All right. Is there any room in the Casey administration for the legalization of drugs in any way?

DG: This has been a great sit-down, but for the last six weeks, I have been trying to get you into this room.

DG: Made calls to your staff. To Troy, to your schedulers, to everybody. Faxes. E-mails. Finally got this rejection letter that said you wouldn't be able to come here. Then you ran into our friend Dan here on Monday. So the question to you is, why have you been ducking us, Bob?

BC: [Laughs] I don't think I am. But, and I know, in a campaign like this you get all kinds of complaints about you not appearing here or your schedule doesn't permit you to come there. I think it was a decision the campaign made at the time that we didn't have the scheduling time available. But I want you to know that Dan is a hell of a damn good reporter. I ran to the men's room, locked the door, he burst down the door, I climbed out the window, he chased me out the window. Chased me down an alley. He tackled me and he put cuffs on me --

BC: I regret that that happened. Because you have to -- sometimes you get in the middle of the campaign and there is a scheduling conflict, and I am happy we got to come in today --

BC: [Laughs] Very. It is busy. This is actually the best time of the campaign. Because you are nearing the end of editorial visits. I mean, you are nearing the end of fundraising. The fundraising part of this campaign has been at times all-consuming, and at times it has felt overwhelming. You have to constantly raise record amounts of money, and that prevented us from doing things I hoped that we could have done, but it does reach a point in the campaign where you just can't raise any more money at the end of the campaign and all that is left is campaigning door-to-door, person-to-person, town-to-town, city-by-city, and that is actually fun. But because of the demands on your time to raise money, there is less and less of the time to do that and less and less of the time to do what we are doing today. I would much rather spend a lot more time talking about CHIP [Children's Health Insurance Program] program and policy and issues than sitting raising money and going to fundraisers. I love people who contribute money, but at times you are in front of fundraising groups all the time.

BC: You can still give, you know. By the way, I have to reimburse you for this lunch. I am not being a goody-two-shoes. But we have these rules in Harrisburg --

BC: So is my wife -- No, my pitch usually is ah, "Joe, how are you? How's it going?' Even if you don't know them really well, you want to make a connection. And often you call people you don't know and I usually try to get to the point: "Hello, how are you doing? The campaign's going well. We have to spend a lot of money, can you help us?' I usually try not to beat around the bush.

BC: Ah, it's the reasonable equivalent of the dog ate the homework. It's "I have to check with my wife' or "my husband.' It's a good backup because it's pretty lame, but if someone called me, that would be my line, because I have to check with my wife because she is the one.

DG: Has money corrupted the process? Are voters cheated because guys like you have to spend so much time raising money?

BC: I don't think there is any question that it cheats people out of more time with the candidate.

BC: Sure. [Fumbles with the plastic wrapper] Oh boy, this will be on the record. Let me see if this thing is opened already. [Pretends to read it.] In the next five minutes, you will achieve your first endorsement. [Laughs all around.] Oh my gosh. "You will be recognized and honored as a community leader.' [Laughs and groans all around.] I guess I am going to be editor. [Laughter] That's great. Thank you very much. Now, when you endorse me, will it be on a Friday or a Saturday, because we have to talk to our media people because we want to come up with some ads.

PC: That's a silly question to ask a weekly newspaper. We come out on Thursdays.

BC: You got me on that. If you have any other questions, you can reach me. Of course, Dan can always find me.

BC: Well, Phil Press does great work. But what hasn't been mentioned is that the other campaign had a videographer. I can't say they are as talented as Phil, but there are plenty of appearances that I made that there was an interesting person running after me with a video camera.

HA: Do you think Ed is ever going to take a swipe at Phil Press? Is that the hope?

Browse The
July 14, 2005
Issue

Join the
City Paper
Mailing List




	search citypaper.net