March 24, 2018

Who Wrote This? The Tribune-Review Editorial Board Or The Post-Gazette's?

We'll start here:
If any lesson can be gleaned from Pennsylvania's congressional district map morass, it's that the process in years to come should be as apolitical as possible.
And here:
Pennsylvania Republicans were right to challenge the new congressional map imposed by the state Supreme Court last month. The state’s high court usurped the role of the Legislature in composing boundaries for legislative districts for the U.S House of Representatives. It was a bad move that will have consequences down the line.
For many years now in Pittsburgh there have been two competing daily newspapers; the ostensibly left-of-center Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the decidedly right-wing The Tribune-Review.

Given that framework, can you guess who wrote which opening paragraph above?

I'll give you more clues. The first editorial also includes this:
The argument that the state's highest court hasn't the constitutional authority to issue a map was rendered moot by the three-judge panel, noting that the plaintiffs in this case didn't have standing to represent the General Assembly.
While the second includes this:
The more important point is that the excesses of gerrymandering have been matched by judicial overreach.
If you guessed that the first was from the left of center P-G and the second from the right wing Trib, you'd be (now wait for it):


The first can be found here at the Trib. And the second here at the once-upon-a-time left of center P-G.

The Tribune-Review also publishes this "Laurel" blurb praising Chief Justice Thomas Saylor:
His condemnation of petitions filed by 12 Republican state lawmakers seeking the impeachment of four Democratic state Supreme Court justices, who voted to overturn the 2011 congressional map drawn by a GOP-controlled Legislature, is a statement of principle that carries even more weight because he's a Republican. “Threats of impeachment directed against justices because of their decision in a particular case are an attack upon an independent judiciary, which is an essential component of our constitutional plan of government,” says Mr. Chief Justice Saylor — a statement that those 12 GOP lawmakers, along with the House and Senate GOP majorities' leadership, need to heed.
While the P-G's opinion ended with this:
The more important point is that the excesses of gerrymandering have been matched by judicial overreach. Usurpation of power can cut both ways. The Democrats who are so pleased with the ruling should realize that the state Supreme Court, at some point, will return to a Republican majority. Will they stay silent if that court hands down a politically tainted decision? Rep. Cris Dush, a Republican from Jefferson County, introduced legislation to impeach the four Democratic justices who voted to impose the new map. His bill will probably fade away, but it’s a measure of the resentment that legislating from the bench can breed.
Not an endorsement of impeachment but you'll note it's not exactly a condemnation either. If anything it says that the targets of Dush's impeachment legislation brought it upon themselves by legislating from the bench.

I know what happened! An large and unpredictable "ion storm" entered the Halkan system just as we were negotiating for dilithium mining rights and when we tried to beam back up to the Enterprise we got zapped by the storm. When we emerged from the transporter room we realized that we were suddenly in a universe where what was once a rational federation was replaced by empire. Oh yea - and Spock has a beard.

That's the only plausible explanation for why the Trib and the P-G editorial boards suddenly switched places.

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