Lori Falce: Pittsburgh is not a political punchline

Political speeches are becoming a lot like a slow night at a comedy club.

That’s not just because of the awkward pauses when a joke doesn’t land right or the forced laughs when a canned joke is trotted out for the millionth time.

Nope, it’s because of the name dropping.

“It’s great to be here in (insert city name here)” is what you hear from a touring performer whose days and nights and locations have become a blur. However that comedian still knows he can get at least one big audience response if he just remembers where the heck he is.

Politicians generally — although not always — know where they are when they are giving a speech. There are usually enough handlers to remind them who they are meeting and why. The name-dropping in politics is more about scoring points when they link a town to an issue.

This is nothing new in Pittsburgh.

The city is synonymous with American manufacturing in a way that is really only comparable with Detroit. Plenty of cities are engaged in making and building and shipping out the millions of products that contribute to the national economy, but most people couldn’t tell you exactly what is made in Poughkeepsie or Little Rock.

But from the Steelers to the Steel City moniker, it’s hard to avoid reminders of the product that put Pittsburgh on the map — and grew its political power.

So, if a politician wants to invoke the power of the blue collar, the working class, the union member, mentioning Pittsburgh is always a way to call out to the audience without actually saying their name.

It happened in 2017 when President Trump pulled out of the Paris Agreement on climate by saying, “I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris.”

It happened again Wednesday when President Biden dropped a reference to the city into his speech to a joint session of Congress: “There is simply no reason why the blades for wind turbines can’t be built in Pittsburgh instead of Beijing.”

He’s right. They can be. Pittsburgh and the surrounding area is built on bending metal to its will, and the area also knows a thing or two about reclaiming its environment from pollution.

But using the name was a way to turn the spotlight on the people who work in manufacturing, and signal to them that this was a way to put those kind of good union jobs in the forefront of a discussion about environment.

Republicans and Democrats responded to the line as coolly and warmly as one would expect on such obvious political red meat.

GOP members like Sen. Ted Cruz threw out references to Biden’s positions and actions on the Paris agreement and gas drilling — a definite Pennsylvania hot button. Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald cheerfully tweeted Pittsburgh would be happy to make turbine blades and “we will build them better,” a likely reference to Biden’s “Build Back Better” campaign slogan.

So everyone knows exactly what is intended when the Pittsburgh name is uttered and the audience responds appropriately — like saying “Who’s there?” when someone starts a joke with “Knock knock.”

What is needed is less using Pittsburgh to get a response. It would be nice to see a politician give a response instead.

The area is shorthand for manufacturing for a reason. Southwestern Pennsylvania is good at it and has been for longer than most U.S. states have been U.S. states. The flagging of manufacturing as jobs have gone overseas has hit the region hard for decades.

Because Democrats and Republicans know the joke, they need to stop letting Pittsburgh be the butt of it.

We know jobs have gone away, and we know they are needed here. Stop dropping the city’s name as a punchline — and pick it up as a challenge.