Corbett and fixing Harrisburg's pipes

While our colleagues at the Inquirer have been rocking the breaking news section with scoops on the growing pressure on Gov. Tom Corbett to upset the fruit basket when it comes to his top aides and on the departure of chief of staff Bill Ward, Capitolwire.com had this insightful analysis shortly after the Ward announcement:

"Corbett wanted a chief of staff he was comfortable with, and Ward, a sensible, bright and hard-working attorney, fit that bill.

But the governor is not comfortable with state government, and will never be. His selecting a guy with minimal Harrisburg experience and connections to run his office here shows that. If you don’t like plumbers, fine, but you still need a guy who can fix the pipes or they leak a lot.

Corbett dislikes the legislative culture here so much that he doesn’t have anyone he trusts who knows how to deal with it.

... Now Corbett has to settle his staff, please his most powerful allies, and, oh, by the way, pass a budget, reform state business loans and development and reform charter schools and teacher evaluations.

Should be a fun month, especially with his most loyal advisors under fierce attack, from the folks who have known Corbett the longest and best."

Meanwhile, the state Democratic Party unsurprisingly was unimpressed by the personnel shuffling. From their statement:

"Pennsylvanians are rejecting Gov. Corbett's policies that raise tuition, hurt schools, and increase property taxes. There is no amount of staff reshuffling that can help Gov. Corbett unless he is willing to change his unpopular polices."

They also dug back into the P-G archives to note that Stephen Aichele, who will shift from general counsel to chief of staff, and his wife, Department of the Commonwealth Secretary Carol Aichele, contributed about $19,000 to Corbett's election efforts.