"Most Progressive" PA Gov Candidate John Hanger on Marijuana, Fracking & Campaign Finance [VIDEO]

[Counterpoint PA]

This is a video from my show Counterpoint PA, the only grassroots progressive newscast exclusively about Pennsylvania politics.

In this video, I present an interview I did with Democratic gubernatorial candidate John Hanger, who portrays himself as "the most progressive candidate in this race on all issues." We discuss his marijuana reform proposal which starts with medical marijuana and phases-in full legalization, his stance on fracking as a former head of the PA Department of Environmental Protection which I pushed him to convince progressives isn't impacted by his ties to the fracking industry, and his campaign finance challenge to the other Democrats running in the gubernatorial primary.

Clarifications:
* this was recorded in 2013, hence references to the election being "next year" (I'm not sure why I said the interview was "live" in the beginning, obviously this video is prerecorded)
* I stated that polls show PA vastly in favor of both medical marijuana and legalization, which is right for medical, but wrong for legalization
* some provisions of Act 13 (PA's fracking law) Hanger references have since been struck down by the PA Supreme Court, more on that coming soon from Counterpoint PA
* sorry that my feet-shuffling led to me standing in a visually awkward position for some of the video, I was filming alone so no one was there to tell me!

Stay in touch on Twitter @CounterpointPA and on Facebook at http://facebook.com/counterpointpa and stay tuned throughout January for the rest of this month's show!

[brooklynite]

1. No point in being the "most progressive" if you can't get elected...

...resulting in the re-election of the "least progressive" candidate.

[Hippo_Tron]

2. Tom Corbett has a 24 percent approval rating...

I'm all for nominating electable candidates and sometimes that means nominating more moderate candidates. But in this case, anybody with a pulse and a D after their name is electable, so we might as well nominate someone who believes in what we do.