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H.S Girls Basketball: Guard Lydia Lawson, Holy Redeemer prepared for Neumann-Goretti

<p>The state&#8217;s new tourism motto &#8211; &#8220;Pennsylvania. Pursue Your Happiness&#8221; &#8211; plays on a line from the Declaration of Independence, something that probably would confuse signers of the tyrant-tossing document.</p><p>Let&#8217;s hope potential visitors ignore historical context and take the catchphrase at face value.</p><p>It certainly has a sweet, carefree sentiment and, as excerpts from our nation&#8217;s founders go, it can fit on a license plate far more easily than &#8220;Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government.&#8221; (Actually, license plate messages are pass&#233; these days; hashtags are in. That explains why the state Tourism Office also introduced <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23PATravelHappy&amp;src=typd" target="_blank">#PATravelHappy.</a>)</p><p>Whether its <a href="http://www.visitpa.com/happiness" target="_blank">rebranding effort </a>can strike a marketing sweet spot, a la &#8220;I love New York,&#8221; remains to be seen.</p><p>Introduced earlier this week in Somerset County, the slogan lacks the sauciness of &#8220;What happens in Vegas, &#8230;&#8221; and the direct appeal of &#8220;Come back to Jamaica.&#8221; But it&#8217;s ours now and presumably for the next several years, phasing out this equally serviceable line chosen in 2004 from 20,000-plus contest submissions: &#8220;The State of Independence.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;Pursue Your Happiness&#8221; arguably outshines former Keystone State mottoes such as &#8220;America Starts Here&#8221; and the mostly forgettable &#8220;Pennsylvania Memories Last a Lifetime.&#8221;</p><p>For grammatical reasons alone, it also supersedes &#8220;You&#8217;ve Got a Friend in Pennsylvania.&#8221;</p><p>A news release issued on the day of the new slogan&#8217;s unveiling stated, &#8220;&#8216;Pursue Your Happiness&#8217; is the product of months of industry input and focus group testing. &#8230;&#8221;</p><p>Cynics might have proposed a motto along the lines of &#8220;On your way to Virginia, might as well stop here.&#8221; But that attitude disparages Pennsylvania&#8217;s top-notch destinations, from Gettysburg&#8217;s battlefield to Erie&#8217;s lake shore, and overlooks the importance of the state&#8217;s $40 billion tourism industry.</p><p>Perhaps not coincidentally, certain industry and government leaders intend next week to call for Pennsylvania to increase its tourism marketing budget. Proponents of this spending say our state has fallen behind its regional competitors in the quest for tourists&#8217; cash. They argue each dollar devoted to spurring tourism yields more than three times that in tax revenue.</p><p>That being the case, maybe the state&#8217;s next motto should take a boldly blunt approach: &#8220;C&#8217;mon over to Pennsylvania; we want your money.&#8221;</p><style>
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Our Opinion: Pennsylvania’s new tourism slogan brings a smile; let’s hope it also brings visitors