Sen. Pileggi makes some national news

Sen. Dominic Pileggi is hitting the big time.

Or at least his somewhat controversial plan to rearrange how Pennsylvania doles out its electoral votes is.

This week our very own Sen. Pileggi, R-9 of Chester, was on the radar of “The Colbert Show.” Host Stephen Colbert was zinging Pileggi and his plan to revise our electoral vote.

Here’s the video: You have to go to about the three-minute mark before Colbert takes aim at Pileggi.

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the way, the name is pronouned Pill-edge-ee, not Pill-leg-ee, as Colbert intoned.

We’ve made much the same criticism of Pileggi's plan on our editorial page.

Unfortunately, Colbert made the same mistake we once made. This is not the senator’s first trip down this path. The first time he rolled it out, last summer, it was based on voting by congressional district. He was rightly harpooned as making an obvious political ploy hoping to deliver the state to GOP hopeful Gov. Mitt Romney. That plan went nowhere.

Pileggi rolled it out again a few weeks after the election and noted that no one could now accuse him of playing politics.

Actually, we did.

But he also made a very important change in his plan. It no longer would divvy up the state’s electoral votes based on congressional districts (which are conveniently dominated by Republicans) and instead allocate them according to vote percentages, with the statewide popular vote winner also getting two additional electoral votes. Right now the state utilizes a winner-take-all method for awarding electoral votes.

Under Pileggi’s plan, President Obama would have been awarded two electoral votes for winning the state, along with 10 of the remaining 18 for snagging 52.088 percent of the popular vote. The rest would have gone to Romney for his share of the popular vote.

It’s not hard to see why the senator wants to change the system. While the GOP has been successful at the local level, and holds a majority when it comes to Congressional districts, they’ve been getting their backsides spanked in presidential races.

You have to go back to George H.W. Bush in 1988 for the last time the state has thrown its weight - and thus its electoral votes - to the GOP column.

No wonder Pileggi is looking to share the wealth. It sure beats being shut out.

The senator insists his new and improved method is a more fair way to distribute the electoral votes.

Yeah, sure.

Think he’d singing that tune if the shoe was on the other foot? If Republicans had been dominating their Dem counterparts for two decades of presidential elections? Uh, neither do I.

But it’s not every day that a Delco elected official makes some national news.

Next thing you know he’ll be doing the Top 10 list.

 

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