Pick a Peck of PA PACS

The budget circus has made my brain hurt, so, like many of you, I have sought comfort in Latin translation and FEC reports.

As it turns out many of our federal elected officials have affiliated political action committees. Some are leadership pacs; I don't know what you would call the other ones.

You can find details on these committees as well as their financial reports on www.fec.gov. At some point in the future I hope to have more detailed posts on some of the ones connected geographically to the Philly suburbs.

Here you go, in the order I scribbled them down on the back of an envelope:

Senate

Bob Casey -- Keystone America PAC
Arlen Specter -- Big Tent PAC*

House

Paul Kanjorski -- Citizens for Action
Patrick Murphy -- Taking the Hill PAC
Joe Pitts -- JoePAC
Bob Brady -- 1776 Leadership PAC
Joe Sestak -- Deep Blue
Allyson Schwartz -- We the People PAC
Bill Shuster -- Bill PAC
John Murtha -- Majority PAC
Charlie Dent -- Dent PAC
Jim Gerlach -- Keystone PAC

There may be others that I missed.

Should this not provide sufficient entertainment value, you might be amused to find out that the Show-Me PAC Fund is now based in Pennsylvania. Perhaps we can balance the state budget by taxing Missourians. The prize for the strangest PA PAC name, though, has to go to the Society for Relief of Distressed and Decayed Pilots Political Action Committee. As far as I could see from a cursory look, it doesn't have a political connection, but you have to admit that the thought of decayed pilots lobbying for something is unusual at best. Try not to think of distressed and decayed pilots next time you board a plane.

* It will be interesting to see what short of whiplash this pac goes through now that the senator has switched parties.