LEFTOVERS: More debate stuff, Kelly’s team moves forward, Barletta’s number

Democrat Dan Onorato on Wednesday continued his drive to debate gubernatorial rival Tom Corbett a zillion times, holding yet another conference call with reporters and announcing a slate of civic groups that he’s hoping will organize these little shin-digs. “We owe the citizens of Pennsylvania the opportunity to hear us directly address the issues that are important to them,” Onorato said. “The next Governor will have to turn around the economy, make the state live within its means, reform government and address education, health care, housing, the environment and other key issues.”

In all the madness, pa2010.com‘s John Manganaro picked up this little nugget: one of the first debates just might be at the University of Pittsburgh. The head of the student government there told John that Onorato has agreed to debate in late September. A campaign spokesman wouldn’t confirm the specifics, but did say a debate at Pitt is likely in the cards.

Meanwhile, John also has some leftovers from his interview with Melanie Brewer, who is Republican Mike Kelly’s new political director in the 3rd Congressional District. He reports that Brewer is already underway in laying the groundwork for her boss to make a run at Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper (D-3) on her Erie home turf. “We’ve thought about Mike’s ideals and those of the voters, and we’re going to focus our message on stimulating small business, reversing health care reform and improving education funding,” Brewer told him. “You can’t talk about jobs in the private sector without addressing education.”

And lastly, Republican Lou Barletta has put a dollar-amount estimate on how much it will take to beat Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11) after two previous losses. The Hazleton mayor told a local Examiner blogger that he thinks it’ll cost $1.2 million. “If we hit that number… we believe we will have enough money to win this election,” Barletta said. “We will never raise as much money as Paul Kanjorski. His money that’s coming from Wall Street and lobbyists is far more than we’ll raise. He will not have the number of volunteers that we’ll have, the common folks. This is not going to be about who has the most money, it’s going to be about who has the most support.”

Oh, and Barletta’s campaign also has yet another Web video talking immigration issues. Our favorite part of this latest video is that it seems to start with the melody of Teenage Wasteland. Our only complaint is that we didn’t get the full song. Check it out below.