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Wednesday, March 21, 2007
A little monkey business in the Legislature
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Give us two weeks off, they said, and we’ll get our act together. They didn’t tell us it was a Marx Brothers revue.
On Tuesday, the Legislature celebrated a 14-day, cobweb-clearing recess by sinking into a duck soup of paranoia, inexperience and gamesmanship that threatens the little work that 236 semi-grown adults have accomplished to date.
One news cycle later, on Wednesday, both the House and Senate were still whispering threats of a special session in May.
The only reason you should care is that the debacle could ultimately threaten short-term funding for tornado-ravaged Americus and many school systems — not to mention millions of dollars for PeachCare, the insurance program that offers health insurance to hundreds of thousands of kids.
Read the news story here.
Maybe you thought it was a bit contrary for a Legislature to consider Confederate history month and an apology for slavery in the same breath.
That was child’s play.
On Tuesday, the House passed a bill to speed murderers to their executions, by requiring the approval of only 10 of 12 jurors. Then the same body put a hold on a $700 million budget bill — which included cash for a near-bankrupt public defender system.
Cash that, given the legal niceties that courts demand, might actually hasten Brian Nichols’ date with a needle.
But the weirdness had begun hours earlier, when House GOP leaders abruptly ended a generations-old tradition by barring reporters from the chamber floor.
We’re told there was concern that some journalists were eavesdropping. But the expulsion also came shortly after the “Cracker Crumble,” an evening of satirical skits and song hosted by the Georgia Press Association.
The March 8 dinner included ribald references to House Speaker Glenn Richardson’s alleged relationship with a gas company lobbyist.
Keeping the news media at a distance is no crime. But the over-the-top reaction of House Republicans — something about it brought to mind the Spartans at Thermopylae — set the tone for the day.
The $700 million budget bill passed by the House, months later than normal, is aimed at filling spending gaps between now and July. Hours after it was sent to the Senate, first-term Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle called on Gov. Sonny Perdue, then on Richardson, the House speaker.
Cagle told both fellow Republicans that he intended to implement a campaign promise. The Senate would strip the budget bill of pork, give schools and PeachCare the money they need, and put the rest toward the debt or a reserve fund.
It was a rookie mistake, a boxer telegraphing his right-hook days in advance.
The act of self-righteous diplomacy was interpreted by Spartans in the House as a threat. Cagle intended to knock down their carefully constructed budget like a stack of blocks.
A little-known rule permits the House to reconsider all of its actions. Leaders sent the House clerk to yank back the two copies of the $700 million budget document sent to the Senate.
House members now say they intend to hold it — and a larger $20 billion budget bill — close to their bosom until the last few days of the session. That way, the Senate has less time to monkey with it.
In the meantime, said House Majority Leader Jerry Keen, his chamber will move no Senate bills, including Cagle’s signature legislation to allow entire school systems to shift to charter school status.
One presumes Cagle will respond likewise. A Legislature that has done little will now do less.
We ran into some top House budget writers in the Capitol on Wednesday afternoon.
In the Legislature, budget negotiations between the House and Senate are commonly viewed as multi-billion dollar poker games. So why, we asked the budget writers, wasn’t Cagle’s statement of intentions treated as just another opening gambit? Why go nuclear?
Because they could, was the answer: “Why did he tell us?”
And here you thought the game was about you.
A moderate Republican gives it a pass: Eldridge out of the race for 10th District
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Here’s the sound on former Athens mayor Doc Eldridge declaring himself out of the 10th District congressional race to fill the seat vacated by the late Charlie Norwood.
“I’m going to sit this one out,” Eldridge told Tim Bryant with WGAU in Athens. Eldridge, who had contemplated running as a moderate Republican, said that family issues had delayed his decision-making — giving Republican state Sen. Jim Whitehead (R-Evans) a three-week head start.
“I didn’t see any way to catch him,” Eldridge said.
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Hmmm. A giant plasma TV and a liquor cabinet….
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Matt Towery’s subscription web site, InsiderAdvantage, has an editorial this morning lamenting what has become a dysfunctional session of the Legislature.
In machine-gun fashion, the editorial mows down the governor, the Republican leadership of the Legislature, and the press — which he says spends far too much time chasing the personal misdeeds of lawmakers. That doesn’t happen in Florida, the piece said. But then it offers the following:
That said, we are not sure the term-limited legislators give the Florida media that much to chase after. By the time they know enough to be full of themselves or to become dangerous, they are out of office. The thought that some big shot legislator would demand that lobbyists buy a giant plasma television for his “hang out,” keep it stocked with unreported spirits and other goodies, and insist on endless meals at his favorite restaurant, again unreported, would never cross anyone’s mind in Florida. It just doesn’t happen.
