>> i'm monica malpass on "inside story." will the controversy of pennsylvania's embattled attorney general end now that kathleen kane says she is not running for re-election? let's get the inside story. ♪ good morning and welcome to "inside story." let's meet our insiders this week. they are terry madonna with the franklin & marshall poll. good morning, sir. ed turzanski, foreign policy analyst. welcome. sharmain matlock-turner, a nonprofit executive. thank you for being here. and dom giordano, talk show host. good morning, dom. glad to have you all. let's talk about kathleen kane, who is being accused of obstruction and perjury, allegedly leaked some grand jury documents, has been embroiled in this for months up to a couple of years at this point with all the allegations going forward. still under possible impeachment proceedings as the house looks into it over the summer. so she has a long way to go, but she says she won't run for re-election. i'm wondering, did somebody say

to her, "if you can just go quietly, we'll get you something. i'll give you another job." what was the real inside scoop on this and why is she not running for re-election, terry? >> well, she's not running simply because someone told her not to. she dances to her own tune, but the fact of the matter is, there's real questions about whether she could have gotten the sufficient petitions to get on the ballot. this is sort of like the greek tragedy. as you point out, she faces trial in august for 12 counts, 2 of them are perjuries, so a criminal count is pretty serious. in addition to that, she narrowly missed being removed out of office by the senate, and now she faces an investigation by the house, and that will commence soon. >> and that could impact whether she ever runs for office again in the state, meaning if they impeach her, she cannot, and she also won't get her pension. so let's talk about where does that leave not only her, but the state, because it's been an embroiled mess and not a lot has been getting done. she says it's the fault of the old-boys' network coming after her because she turned on a few folks, as she said,

and done a little bit of naughty e-mailing -- a lot more than a little -- thousands of e-mails. she released some of them, about half. let's listen to her sound bite about why she's leaving to focus on her children now. >> my sons have learned that you don't stand on the sidelines, that you fight the fight, and you fight it the best that you can each and every day. i believe that my legacy is going to be, in time, that i have torn down this good old-boy network. >> she is the first woman attorney general in pennsylvania. she says it's run by old boys that don't want her to get ahead specifically because she's a woman. did she have any impact on the so-called old-boys' network, or what did she do positive, dom? >> i think she's an embarrassment -- i can't say it enough -- to females and being the first in the job, and the repercussion of that is always negative. the idea that these guys in harrisburg were doing what they did. some of them have suffered, and they should have for it. old-boys' network, in fact, i think is a woman. and i did the governor corbett show with him and many times would ask him. i think they were afraid because she was a first. she had star power.

and i think they didn't challenge her. she is very, to me, incompetent. she can't take questions. she does some national show. she did the news conference the other day. she did an interview with you guys. i was shocked. she almost never does it, and i think the reason is, she was a figure that was not competent, and this is a key post. it underlines that again and again. >> well, the governor from her own party asked her to step down in august. her own party wouldn't back her for re-election. she really was sort of an island, if you will, sitting out there by herself, and was it her own doing? was it a fait accompli at this point? >> oh, it absolutely was, and terry referenced the greek tragedy. what happens in the greek tragedy is it's usually hubris, false pride that puts someone in the position where they don't see their own flaws. they wind up doing inexplicable things. they've really done more harm to themselves than anyone else could, and the appeal to feminism really does ring hollow. she sounds more like madeleine albright warning women

that they'll go to hell if they don't vote for hillary. >> right. >> it's a very dated view, and, also, as terry and dom have both indicated, we just don't have enough time in this program to go in detail through all her missteps. >> right. so let's talk about a couple of things quickly. with her, now, this isn't the end of what we're going to hear about her, is it? do you think, sharmain? >> no, it's not gonna be the end because we're gonna hear all about the investigation that's going on in the house, and then if they decide to impeach her, we're gonna have a trial in the senate. so it's not gonna be the end of what we hear, but it is extremely disappointing, i think, for a number of people. certainly for women who definitely were looking forward to having someone come into that office and really do a terrific job, and the fact that she came in with such high hopes for a lot of folks really is extremely disappointing. it doesn't mean, though, that there's not an old-boys' network. i just don't think that all

of her missteps and all the mistakes that she made had anything at all to do with that. i think she made some really bad political judgments early on, and they just continued to be compounded. >> and five people are pretty excited that she is not running for re-election, and those happen to be men who are running. so let's talk about what's gonna happen now with josh shapiro, steve zappala, john rafferty, joe peters, and john morganelli. they must be cheering out there because that sort of side show, if you will, that became the main circus act for a while is now at least gonna be a side show in the race for attorney general. don't you think? >> i don't know if they're cheering because i think some of them, like shapiro here -- i know him. they have a tremendous record as an executive, no corruption, none of that, and he reeks of competency. so he plays well off that, i think. i think it was helpful to him. >> there's another aspect of this. the race on the democratic side is going to pit two different philosophies. >> yeah. >> stephen zappala, the district attorney from allegheny county, is going to make the argument, "i was a prosecutor."

he hasn't been in a court in 25 years. "i know how to try cases. i understand the law. i've been there." shapiro, on the other hand, who's not prosecuting cases, is gonna say, "we need reform in the office. we need administration that's efficient and effective. i'm gonna make sure that office runs and runs right." so you're going to have two different views of what the attorney general's office should be -- how it should be conducted, and it's probably a little of both that's important, but you're gonna hear two different world views. >> right. one nugget i would throw in, too -- there's 40,000 or so penn state alumni in the state. i've had their pr spokesperson on -- this woman. they claim to have taken down corbett. they sent a message the other day. everybody that wants to be state attorney general, stop the charges against the big three -- graham spanier and the other two at penn state. i find that to be appalling that we've not gotten to the bottom of that, but they're trying to chill them right out of the box. >> all right, we'll keep an eye on that, as well. >> well, the other issue here is, there's still lots of folks who defend children who think

that there were additional victims. you hear that all the time. >> on the jerry sandusky case, which is part of what kathleen kane was trying to get forward. >> that's correct, but her own investigator, geoffrey moulton, former prosecutor down here, federal prosecutor, said, "no, that's not the case." he did say that the corbett administration didn't move quickly enough, but it wasn't for political reasons to advance the governor, who was then attorney general, to the governorship, and that was a big issue. >> all right. we're gonna move on to talk about some other chess moves that are happening in harrisburg. interesting. the state representative brian sims decided to drop out of the race for congressman chaka fattah's seat -- fattah's under investigation, as you know, by the federal investigators -- and endorsed dwight evans, a representative, instead. what's going on behind the scenes there? what do you think, sharmain? >> well, i think, number one, petitions were due for a lot of people this week, including people who are running for state rep, and brian certainly needed to file petitions not only for congress, but also for state rep.

>> you can run for both at the same time for people that don't know. >> but i do think that in the end, he had to make a decision one way or the other. the momentum clearly seems to be flowing towards dwight evans. i will tell you that dwight is certainly a friend of mine, but i have gotten calls for fundraisers for him almost every day. there definitely seems to be those who are looking for a different candidate other than the current candidate, congressman fattah. it seems to be coming in dwight's direction. >> in the meantime, a new poll. let's move on to other things in harrisburg -- the governor. governor tom wolf, freshman governor, has still not gotten his first budget passed. it's time for the second budget to be proposed now. how long can this game go on of sort of brinksmanship, both sides digging in and giving nothing, and here we are with year two? are the schools gonna have to keep borrowing money? what do we do? >> when the schools get to the point where they cannot borrow money, and the cuts start leading to reductions of

services and closed classrooms, that is when i suspect there's going to be a critical mass, and right now i think it's hard to predict who's going to come out on top or bottom in all this -- whether it's the governor or the legislature. >> well, the polls show that people of pennsylvania disapprove of how the governor's doing. there's a very bad 77% disapproval rating currently for him, but if you look at a similar poll of the legislature, they don't like the way the legislators are going about this, either. >> critical mass could come, though, with the holidays, the easter holidays. the last time with the christmas holidays, they had to do some patchwork because it's convenient to say we're not going to come back after the holidays. i think people -- i can't speak for the rest of the state. i know my listeners, they don't care. they don't feel affected by any of this. it's a pox on both sides. they don't care about it. >> the problem in terms of the voters is simply that in a 2009 supreme court decision, state employees are staying on the job, so most services are being performed, so it doesn't affect the average voter, but the biggest takeaway from my

point of view is this -- relationships are worse after the governor's budget message a couple of weeks ago than they were before. there are no meetings taking place, and it now looks like this stalemate could go on. the real crunch will come about april and may when the schools begin to run out of the first six months' money they got. county human services and nonprofits that are providing services will begin even more acutely to feel the pain. we've once gone in the '60s 15 months with stopgap budgets. >> wow. here we go again. >> yep. well said. "here we go again." >> let's talk about mayor jim kenney, new in office in philadelphia, and he did lay out a business plan to members of the chamber of commerce last week and had some interesting ideas. let's run through just a couple and see what your reactions are. of course, he's been talking about money for universal pre-k to get started right away by this fall. jobs for prisoners. he wants a plan to cut wage and business taxes to make it a friendlier city for business and recruit suburban business and help small-business folks,

but he also wants to improve parks and recreation centers, and i read an interesting statistic -- i'm sure you saw it, too -- that hunting park redid its local park and rec area, and $5 million was invested, but they got an 87% improvement in three years -- less crime, and more activity for young people because the studies show mostly after school is when these crimes are being committed. they have nowhere to go and nothing to do unless you give them a place to go. what was your takeoff of his idea on parks and recreations? >> well, it's a very interesting thought, and it dovetails with what the mayor wants to do in terms of universal pre-k, and he also did point to some metrics that say, "this is a very effective way to fight crime over the long-term." the tone of the presentation was very good, very engaging. he said to the business community, "normally mayors come in here and give a long list of here's what we want from you. let's talk about what we can do

together." all of that was great. the devil will be in the details, and the mayor did say that -- he didn't ask the business community to pay for these things. >> no, not directly. >> but he said, "that will come in my budget message to city council." that will be very interesting because philadelphia, like other big cities, is caught in this blue-city-model trap where pension costs are draining any operational monies that you would put to purposes like that. how are you going to deal with that pension cost so you've got the money to do all these other good things? >> i agree with ed. i thought the tone was fine, but, again, based upon his politics, kenney's politics, i think it has to come back to things that business is not gonna like if they don't buy into this, and it involves -- i think it's $60 million-plus for the pre-k program. where is it gonna come from? it doesn't like look the state. >> right. >> but i think in the end, if you look at the priorities

that he set, he's really focusing on what we would call the prevention side of problems, and we've got to get to that point. >> but it does take longer. it's not a quick fix. >> it takes longer, but if we start to intervene now, we can really have an impact on poverty. one thing i will give him, during the campaign, he said, "ending and lowering poverty in philadelphia is critical. you can't do it on the back end. you've got to do it on the front end. you've got to do it with kids going to rec centers and schools, working, and it's going to take time." >> all right. >> the other point i would make is, i think what we're seeing is a slow, steady process here. nothing revolutionary. nothing that's gonna strike huge controversy out of the gate. he reminds me much less of mike nutter and much more like john street. you know more about this than i do. >> mm-hmm. >> it just seems the style -- a lot of people were saying, "well, he's going to be bill de blasio, he's going to come out and be, you know --" >> we'll see. >> yeah, we might still see. but the fact is that right now

the slow, steady, pretty responsible start. >> but he also knows the city well. having served in council, having worked in harrisburg, i mean, he really does know the city and communities, and i think he has a good sense that it's now time to really focus in. if we're gonna really deal with the really tough problems we have, we've got to focus in on the city. >> and he also mentioned stop-and-frisk, which was a big campaign issue, and he implied that it was being misused. he said, in his words, "that he wants that tool to be used correctly." so, did you have a take on that? just he's trying to allay that in the minority community. >> so, yes, and it's a rhetorical flourish to try to bring back into use a tactic that, quite frankly, had been effective. here's the problem. we go through these periods like this where the crime gets out of control. people demand more aggressive policing. they get it, and then -- >> it's an overreaction. >> well, as the problems diminish, they say, "we really

don't need this anymore." >> all right. >> and we will always be coming back to this issue because that cycle's never going to end. >> but minority communities, i'm sorry, don't want to deal with levels of crime that are there, but at the same time, they don't want people treated unfairly, they don't want people stopped just for the sake of the fact that they're walking down the street. they want there to be some probable cause there, and just the fact that you're just going to see a person of color, primarily a boy or a young man of color, and assume that you can arrest them and then ask questions later -- no, that's not acceptable, and it's something that we're still gonna be fighting very hard against. >> all right. we'll take a break. "inside story" continues right after this. >> "inside story" is presented by temple university. temple fuels students with academics and opportunities to take charge. plugged into the city, powered by the world. temple.edu/takecharge.

♪ >> welcome back to "inside story." a huge decision last week by the pennsylvania supreme court that the school reform commission in philadelphia can no longer cancel or bypass provisions of the state school code, and, in fact, they were allowed to for years because it was an ability to expedite school closings if they needed to, limit charter expansion, even cancel built-in raises for teachers and not have to bring back people who had been laid off because of seniority if they didn't think they were the most effective. those rights were granted to them many years ago, but the supreme court said they were wrongly granted, and,

essentially, it rolls back about 15 years of work. some people would say for the good or for bad. what's your take on that, dom? >> i think for the bad. i mean, i love a guy like bill green, who gave up a lot of other things and went there to turn things around. i think they're hamstrung now. i like the src because i don't think philadelphia can run its own system. i think it's been proven time and time again, and i wanted to see them put these reforms in that i thought were good reforms. >> and one of the members of the src reacted to this decision, saying it's gonna cost tens of millions and be disastrous for the children of philadelphia. >> i think in the end, there's a big push now to say we need to regain local control. it's not about having the state take over. it's unfortunate. when you look nationally at state takeovers, they're primarily in cities and primarily in cities where the majority of the students are students of color. this is a pretty dangerous precedent. i think in the end, as much as the src, i believe, has been working on the best interests of kids, i think we need to really, again, look at local control of our schools. >> even jerry jordan with the pft, the philadelphia

federation of teachers, says this is a mixed decision because it can hurt the kids, but help the teachers, in fact. >> this decision could have an implication for charter schools and school districts outside of the city, and we're gonna have to see where that goes as time moves on. >> let's talk about the supreme court. antonin scalia passed away after 40 years on the high court. what was your impression of his legacy from all those years? >> he was an extraordinary jurist. he had a very specific constitutional point of view in terms of being a textualist, looking at the original intent, and i think over time, people -- i actually think his reputation will grow over time, because when people pause to delve deeply into what he was saying, a lot of the popular representations of his views are going to disappear. he was not nearly what many of his critics thought he was.

>> it did certainly bring a big political ball game into motion because people running for the presidency now say, look. all three branches of government are at play. we have a balance of liberals and conservatives on the court because he was one of the deciding votes. we don't have that now. whoever's running for president is gonna get to appoint, and some are arguing obama should not appoint, that the next president should, and, of course, the balance of power in the legislature in congress is up for grabs. so all three branches are urgently in need of attention. what do you think about it? >> i think -- certainly i give my condolences to the family of the late justice, and certainly also understand the political side of what's going on now. i mean, i think the president has to make a nomination. that's his job. it's up to the senate to then advise or consent or not. i'm really hoping that, though, for the first time, we're gonna have an african-american woman seriously considered for the supreme court. we have not had an african-american woman on the court, and i'm hoping that the president will certainly make that choice

this time. >> last word by terry. >> yeah, i mean, it's apparent that this is gonna be an issue in the campaign. the republicans at the moment in the senate seem firm that they're not going to bring the nomination up for a vote. they may not even have a hearing on it. chairman grassley, chuck grassley, who chairs the senate judiciary committee, said he would like to hold a hearing, but there's a dilemma there. if they do appoint a well-qualified person, and he or she is a star at the hearings, it's going to add pressure for the republicans to put on the record a vote. this has some potential to be an issue next fall in the presidential election. again, only time will tell how important it will be. >> we'll have inside stories coming your way in just a moment when we take a break. we'll be right back. ♪

to take charge. plugged into the city, powered by the world. temple.edu/takecharge. ison reform, jobs and pension restructuring, race relations, even urban redesign. feel free to tweet or post your new ideas to us at 6abc action news by next thursday. we will include some of those in the program, and listen in, because there are gonna be some very innovative ideas that are coming forward. also, we want to have an honor to a very important icon who was really a trailblazer in the philadelphia area. we want to show you acel moore, who was a pulitzer prize-winning journalist. he worked for 43 years at the philadelphia inquirer, and, really, more than that, changed the way the newspaper even covered the african-american community and brought a lot of young people into journalism. so our hearts go out to him. he passed away last week at the age of 75, and we want to

say a really very heartfelt we're sorry to linda wright moore, his wife, who is a longtime panelist here on "inside story." a lot of love goes out to his family. let's have our "inside stories of the week," and let's start with you, dom. >> my inside story is mast charter school in northeast philadelphia apparently is keyed in to technology and things of that nature where they held a lottery for next year's students to come in. only 99 seats, and they had 8,000 applicants, and you guys and others showed how crestfallen people were. it tells me the charter-school movement should be embraced. there's something that's happening there. a lottery, and you think your kid's life depends on it is a pretty sad story, but i think it's real. >> terry. >> lots of attention on the election of delegates to the conventions, but not much attention on what we call superdelegates. these are officials who go -- they're party officials and members of congress, et cetera, but guess what? one-third of the convention delegates to the democratic convention are superdelegates. currently hillary clinton leads

481 to 55. imagine if it comes down to the wire, and the establishment picks hillary clinton to be the nominee. >> all right. ed. >> monica, marcellus shale means that there are more btu's of energy under the ground in pennsylvania than in saudi arabia. some people want to tax it as the best way to take advantage. the chester council for business and industry got together with the lebow school of business at drexel. they had a program on friday for businesses trying to find how do you take advantage of this low-cost gift? >> mm. all right. sharmain. >> this friday, one of the most important films of the year was released just in time for black history month, and it's called "race," and it's about the story of jesse owens and the 1936 olympics. it's a powerful story, it's a lot of really quality information, but it really reminds us of what people have gone through in order to get to where we are today. >> all right, so a must-see for everyone.

>> a must-see. >> thank you so much. and that's "inside story" for this week. i hope you found out some interesting information. we appreciate all of your input. i'm monica malpass. have a great week ahead. we'll see you next week on "inside story" for the very special "new ideas" program. have a great week. ♪ i'm nydia han along with gray hall. coming up next on "action news," a man and three young boys are in critical condition after a bad wreck on the boulevard. we're live. developing right now, 6 people are killed in a shooting rampage in michigan. police have a suspect in custody. delaware couple were rushed to the hospital after being saved from a burning home. those stories and more next on "action news."

good afternoon, it is sunday, february 21 i'm nydia han along with gray hall. here's some of the stories we're following on "action news." developing a man is behind bars after allegedly killing 6 people in a shooting rampage in michigan. we are learning more about the suspect at this hour.