Joe for Congress
In the 13th Congressional District, three stellar candidates are seeking the Republican nomination in the April 27 primary election. The Northeast Times last week endorsed Al Taubenberger in that contest.
Today we focus on the Democratic contest between state Sen. Allyson Schwartz and former Deputy Mayor Joseph Torsella.
Gentle readers, it’s not a particularly easy choice. Both candidates have excellent credentials, would enhance the Democratic ticket in the general election, and would make this a close contest indeed. We hold both candidates in high regard. But the Bush vs. Gore case of 2000 notwithstanding, in a two-person political race there has to be a winner and a loser.
Joe Torsella appears to have the better chance of defeating any of the Republican candidates to keep the 13th Congressional District seat in the Democratic column, and therefore, the Times wholeheartedly endorses him in the primary.
Give a tip of the hat to Allyson Schwartz. The lady senator has a powerful commitment to issues of paramount interest to women and children. This unabashed supporter of abortion rights helped to create Philadelphia’s first women’s health center, the Elizabeth Blackwell Center. She is a former acting commissioner of the Philadelphia Department of Human Services, and in her 14 years in the state Senate she helped to create a program that means so much to so many families — the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). She also wrote legislation that established quality standards for mammograms and required insurance companies to cover necessary women’s health services. This seasoned legislator knows how to get Democratic legislation passed in a Republican-controlled state Senate.
Schwartz also has a record of support among voters and is making Torsella work hard for the nomination. She won her state Senate post in 1990 by crushing Republican-turned-Democrat-turned Republican Joseph Rocks.
In a six-person Democratic primary for U.S. Senate four years ago, Schwartz finished a strong second. Running without support of her own party, she won nearly half of the vote in the 13th Congressional District. She won all but one of Northeast Philadelphia’s wards and Montgomery County.
This year, the ideal situation would be this: Schwartz wins 49.9 percent of the vote. That amount of support would be moral justification for Schwartz to run against archconservative Republican U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum in 2006. Had Schwartz, not the largely unknown Ron Klink, been the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in 2000, Schwartz probably would have sent Santorum — who is to the right of Attila the Hun — to his rightful place in retirement.
Schwartz does have a few flaws. She demonstrated questionable political wisdom in 1991 when she endorsed George Burrell, not Ed Rendell, for mayor (now, Gov. Rendell is neutral in the Schwartz-Torsella race), and in 2001 when she endorsed Alex Talmadge’s failed bid to oust the mighty District Attorney Lynne Abraham.
And until recently, Schwartz was a staunch foe of the death penalty. Now, she says she supports it for terrorists, but not for cop killers. Senator, cop killers are terrorists. And Schwartz does not see fit to support the full extension of Woodhaven Road to Philmont Avenue. Shame on her.
The world will not end if progressive Democrats in the 13th district send Schwartz to the general election, but in doing so, they would bypass a man who may well become a rising star in the Democratic Party in Pennsylvania. Joe Torsella is an intelligent, affable guy with a strong grasp of the issues — all of the issues.
Joe Torsella has never held elective office — Northeast Philly has not sent somebody like that to Congress in decades — but he has served some of the best and brightest.
As deputy mayor under Rendell, Torsella helped Rendell bring Philadelphia back from the financial abyss created by Mayor Wilson Goode. And, while Torsella was Goode’s Northeast coordinator in 1983, voters ought not hold that against him. Every candidate is entitled to one mistake in life.
The sparkling new Constitution Center downtown is perhaps Torsella’s crowning jewel. Before it opened, it had a $200,000 operating-budget deficit. As president of the center, Torsella turned that into a $200,000 operating-budget surplus. He did that, in part, by working with the Republican leadership in Congress and the Republican-controlled U.S. Supreme Court.
Torsella vows to give back 5 percent of his salary — “I want to lead by example,” he says — and his bold plan to maximize the development potential of the Delaware riverfront should be exploited for all it’s worth, with the aid of his pal in Harrisburg, the governor.
With health care near the top of the domestic agenda, Torsella has some good ideas. He says an electronic record-keeping system would help to save money and slice medical errors, and he wants the Food and Drug Administration to make prescription drugs available over the counter.
Like Taubenberger, he supports extending Woodhaven Road to Philmont Avenue, and he pledges to introduce legislation in his first term to allow the federal government to limit the number of Section 8 houses on a given block.
Torsella is personally opposed to abortion, but unlike Taubenberger, he supports abortion rights. “I believe in Roe vs. Wade. There is a constitutional right to privacy,” he says.
Torsella’s pragmatism on the war in Iraq is impressive. He says U.S. troops should stay in Iraq until the job is done, and he says the Islamic nation is capable of eventually having democratic rule.
Meanwhile, Torsella’s ambitious nature could pay off big time for Northeast Philadelphia. In the House, he says he wants to serve on the Ways & Means, Commerce, or Budget committees — that’s a bold declaration for a guy who’s not even a freshman member of Congress yet.
If Torsella is elected to Congress, chances are he would not emulate former Rep. Bob Borski, whom Roll Call magazine once rated as one of the most obscure members of Congress.
“With some luck, I think I can be a congressman of consequence,” Torsella says.
This above-Average Joe has done his homework. Now, voters, it’s time to put him to the test. ••