Home > Political Insider > Archives > 2007 > March > 01 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USWho knew that the Legislature tracked the stock market?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Leave it to China to create the perfect metaphor for this year’s session of the Legislature.
We were chatting with House Rules Committee Chairman Earl Ehrhart (R-Powder Springs) about the sloth-like pace of things. The man who controls the flow of legislation on that side of the Capitol began with the party line.
“We are trying to develop a more deliberative pace,” he said. “We’re truely going to prove that we are the party of limited government. The key to this is in the committees. The work needs to be done right, so that we don’t have to come down here year after year and fix ‘oopses.’”
But there are other reasons for the slow-down. Gov. Sonny Perdue’s style in his first term was laissez faire. Now pre-occupied with plugging the hole in PeachCare, the governor is even more hands-off this year. Which means there’s no prime mover, insisting that bills keep inching along.
“He doesn’t have a legislative agenda, really,” Erhhart said.
Then there’s China. In the first two years of the Republican takeover in the House, Ehrhart said, there was a pent-up demand for legislation that Democrats had denied over the decades. That has subsided, the chairman said. Everyone’s taking a breather.
See? This is a market correction.
Ehrhart held out the possibility that this year’s fight over the licensing of hospital services across the state could stretch into next year. So could debate over his proposal for education tax credits, he admitted.
Expect the pace to pick up when the Legislature comes back, he said. That will continue through 2008. “We’re probably slowing it down a little bit much. we’ll probably level it out over the next year,” Ehrhart said.
Comments
Commenting is now closed for this entry.
By CommonSenseRules
March 1, 2007 9:37 AM | Link to this
RE: Sunday beer and wine sales.
Although Rep. Shafer of Duluth is right to reflect the wishes of his constitutents, he apparently does not trust the broader concept of democracy, and its exercise by the wider Georgia citizenry.
The specious “blood on your hands” argument about purchasing alcohol on Sundays — as opposed to the Sabbath (not all groups consider Sunday their Sabbath), disregards the alcohol-related mayhem that is committed in homes and on state highways the six other days of any given week. Those who appear to be in most vociferous opposition do not purchase “demon rum” anyway. Let the rest of the populace, including tea-totalers who oppose governmental neo-Puritanism, decide. Get the bill out of committee, Rep. Shafer. Let the Georgia electorate decide!
By Larry
March 1, 2007 10:59 AM | Link to this
I don’t drink alcoholic beverages. It’s a personal choice which means a choice made by me, not by any government for me. Our government should not let a small, theocratic group decide for the larger population which days alcohol should be sold. It should be decided by the people of the great state of Georgia.
Our constitution is in a real mess. It seems that it requires amendment to change almost anything. Our legislature is a bigger mess when it allows four people of known bend to decide if the people of Georgia get to decide if they want to be able to purchase alcohol on Sunday or force them to make a “beer run” on Saturday night. Polls show that the people want Sunday sales, but their wishes are thwarted by three men who are influenced by the faulty arguments of a very vocal theocracy.
Republicans - the “less government choice” - HA!!