Ridge disgusted by government standoff
Former Gov. Tom Ridge, who understands Washington from the perspective of both a lawmaker and a presidential cabinet member, had harsh words Thursday about the government standoff.
Former Gov. Tom Ridge, who understands Washington from the perspective of both a lawmaker and a presidential cabinet member, had harsh words Thursday about the government standoff.
"I've gone from disappointment to disgust," Ridge said in an interview.
Ridge served six terms in Congress, from 1983 to 1995, and it was a time, he recalled, when there was bipartisanship on any number of issues. He would go on to be elected to two terms as Pennsylvania governor before being picked by President George W. Bush as the nation's first secretary of homeland security.
"I don't think you'll ever find a speech when I condemned a Democrat or the Democratic Party," Ridge, a Republican, said. "Our responsibility was to find answers to Pennsylvania's challenges."
Ridge, 68, blamed a failure of leadership in both the White House and Congress.
"They share equal responsibility for the politicization of this crisis," said Ridge, adding that he thought the president's health-care overhaul was "one of the worst pieces of legislation" but was the law.
"You may not like it, but you don't shut down the government," Ridge said.
Ridge was conducting interviews on the day Mercyhurst University in his hometown of Erie announced it was the recipient of more than one million documents and artifacts representing Ridge's three decades in politics.
Ridge, who owns a home in Erie, said he chose the local institution in part to recognize his father, a traveling salesman who passed up the chance for promotions to raise his family in the city.
Among the items in the collection are works of art and gifts to the governor and his wife, Michele; photographs; campaign banners; a giant pen used to sign the largest tax cut in Pennsylvania history; along with reams of documents relating to his time in Harrisburg, in Congress, and as secretary of homeland security.
A particularly poignant - and personal - piece of the collection is the transcripts of news conferences and other documents from 9/11, when then-Gov. Ridge took a helicopter ride over the still-burning Flight 93 crash site near Shanksville. Just weeks later, Ridge was named by Bush to be his special assistant on homeland security and later elevated to secretary of the new cabinet department.
"It was a dramatic turning point in the country's history," said Ridge. "We were in an entirely different world."