Thursday, May 3rd, 2007...7:08 am
Wow, This Ain’t Working Out Too Well At All
Reports are now afoot at the capitol that the votes that were promised by renegade Democrats for Speaker Jim Weier’s budget plan have vaporized. Either these Democrats have gotten cold feet after the pounding they have taken from AEA members (geez, imagine if they were still allowed to hit these breakaways with rulers…) and a mysterious robocall campaign, or, as some suspect, these folks were not actually consulted before their votes were promised in the first place.
So, what’s the big deal, I mean, Weiers should be able to get the votes in his own caucus right? Not so, apparently. According to Arizona Capitol Reports, conservatives Andy Biggs, Eddie Farnsworth and Trish Groe are not happy with the budget, and neither are moderates Jennifer Burns, Pete Hershberger, Andrew Tobin and Lucy Mason. Weiers would need at least five Democrats to vote for this budget to make up for the defections, and it’s starting to look like he might get, if he’s really lucky, four. That’s assuming that he can keep the remaining Republicans “under the whip,” as they say in Parliament.
Oh, and it’s time for the excuses: two contradictory sets of reasons are being given by the folks who voted for the budget in committee. The first one is that Tim Bee asked them to do it. Yeah, I can see it now, “Hey, could you cut this deal so you can help the Speaker have faux-bipartisan cover when he screws me?” The other funny part of this one is that it means that these folks are saying that it’s okay for them to vote against the caucus and the Governor because a Republican asked them to.
The other reason, which totally contradicts the first and also seems to be quite a stretch. These folks, so they claim, did this to mess with Bee in an attempt to discredit him before he tries to run against Gabrielle Giffords next year. Um, yeah. If anything, it makes the rather conservative Bee look like the more moderate and sensible guy, and maybe he can even now say he passed the budget for the Governor over bipartisan objections. Giffords will swat Bee without your help, folks.
NB - I’ve had questions, questions from high placed readers even, about what the heck the “Mutiny” logo is. I’ll save that for a Saturday morning post.
4 Comments
May 3rd, 2007 at 7:48 am
about the logo: I thought it was soccer related.
I need to google it to see if I am correct.
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:26 am
It’s the logo for the (now defunct) Tampa Bay Mutiny of Major League Soccer.
May 3rd, 2007 at 10:28 am
I knew it!
May 6th, 2007 at 11:23 am
The Tampa Bay Mutiny is no more.
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