The coming week...

As usual, all info gathered from the websites of the relevent political bodies/agencies, except where noted, and subject to change without notice...

This will be a brief post due to other pressing matters, but I'll try to hit the high points.


In the U.S. House of Representatives, they'll be reconvening after their holiday recess on Tuesday. Much of the week's agenda will be taken up with post office namings and the like, but one highlight will be consideration of H.R. 4154, the Permanent Estate Tax Relief for Families, Farmers, and Small Businesses Act of 2009. From the CRS summary -

Repeals provisions of the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 (EGTRRA) eliminating the tax on estates and generation-skipping transfers and the step-up in basis provisions for property acquired from a decedent for estates of decedents dying after 2009. Declares that the sunset provision (general terminating date of December 10, 2010) of EGTRRA shall not apply to title V of such Act (Estate, Gift, and Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax Provisions).

Amends the Internal Revenue Code to allow a $3.5 million estate tax exclusion and a reduction in the maximum estate and gift tax rate to 45% after 2009.

Yup, there will be serious controversy over this one.

Oh yeah...

...The most interesting week should be in the U.S. Senate - they'll be holding floor debate on health care reform. Because of the cloture vote taken on November 21, there will be limits on the debate (though there will still be a lot of it). As such, expect Republican obstructionists to whine that there won't be "enough time" to properly consider all of the ramifications of health care reform.

That's crap.

The Senate's committee schedule is here.

...The Arizona Corporation Commission will hold a securities meeting on Monday; the ACC's hearing schedule is here.

...The Arizona Board of Regents will meet on Thursday and Friday at U of A. The agenda is here.

...The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors will meet in "informal" session on Monday and *formal* session on Wednesday.

...The Board of Directors of the Central Arizona Project will hold a regular meeting on Thursday.

...The Tempe City Council isn't scheduled to meet this week, but the Council Calendar is here.

...The Scottsdale City Council is scheduled to meet on Tuesday. At 2 p.m., they will hold an executive session to interview three candidates for the vacant City Attorney job. At 5 p.m., they will hold a regular meeting. The City's Community Meeting Notice is here.

Later...

North Indian Bend Wash Superfund Site update: small spill

From an email from Rachel Loftin, the EPA's Project Manager -

Dear NIBW Community Involvement Group -

I am sending this to let you know of a release of untreated water which occurred on Monday, November 23rd, from a drain pipe which is connected to the groundwater extraction and treatment system of the Central Groundwater Treatment Facility (CGTF).

Here's what EPA has learned from the City of Scottsdale:

First, and most importantly, we want you to know that the release did not impact the drinking water supplied by the Central Groundwater Treatment Facility (CGTF).

On Monday, November 23rd, a release of untreated water was noticed within 10 minutes of turning on well 75. The well and CGTF were shut down as quickly as possible. The release originated at a drain pipe. Between 500-1000 gallons of water was released resulting in an overflow into a retention basin at the adjacent park. The City cordoned off the spill area in the park and collected a soil and groundwater sample. Preliminary groundwater results are 9 micrograms per liter (ug/l) of TCE and 1 ug/l of PCE. These concentrations are quite low.

Because of the short duration of the spill, low volume of water released, and the low detections of TCE and PCE in the spill area, the preliminary data indicates that the public was not impacted by the release.


What happens next?

The City is gathering additional facts and sampling results, and will provide them to EPA early next week. In turn, I will provide the additional information to all of you early next week as well. The City is also developing an incident report with recommendations for next steps which I will pass on to all of you when I receive it.

Please contact me at 415/972-3253 or by e-mail if you should have any questions. In the meantime, I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

Best,

Rachel
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rachel Loftin
Remedial Project Manager
U.S. EPA, Region 9 Superfund Division, SFD-6-2
75 Hawthorne Street
San Francisco, CA 94105
E-mail: Loftin.Rachel@epa.gov
Phone: 415/972-3253
Fax: 415/947-3528

Because the email came through so late on a Friday, I won't be able to follow up on this until Monday at the earliest, and since I have stuff on my schedule already, perhaps not even then.

Anyway, have a good weekend...

The political prognostication thing is easy...

Earlier today, I posted about how Sen. Chuck Gray (R-Pearce's saddle partner) was going to forego a re-election run next year in favor of pursuing "business opportunities."

Contained in that post was the prediction that Republican Rich Crandall, one of LD19's state reps, would pursue the spot in the Senate.

Turns out that prediction was spot on.

From the AZ Rep's Political Insider -

Rep. Rich Crandall is likely to contend for the state Senate seat from east Mesa that Chuck Gray is vacating.

Crandall announced a Senate exploratory committee, noting that Gray does not intend to seek re-election.

{snip}

Crandall is in his second term in the House and chairs the House Education Committee. A move to the Senate is tempting, especially since the Senate Education Committee chairmanship will be open after 2010, as current chairman John Huppenthal is term-limited.

As of this writing, the AZSOS' office hasn't posted any info regarding a Crandall exploratory committee, and Gray's committee is still official "active" (according to his most recent financial report, which is a year old, , he still has over $14K in the committee's treasury). Expect those facts to change within a week or so.

Chuck Gray (R-LD19) not seeking reelection next year

Chuck Gray, the winger state senator from East Mesa (with Russell Pearce covering West Mesa, Mesa is represented in the State Senate by all sorts of nutty), has announced that he won't be running for re-election next year in order to pursue as yet unspecified "business opportunities."

Not being a Republican, much less an East Mesa Republican, I don't have any insight into who is going to step forward as candidates to replace Gray as the third member of the R slate in LD19. However, my best guess is that they will be contending for a House seat, as State Rep. Rich Crandall will probably try to move over to the Senate.

He was rumored to be interested in the Superintendent of Public Instruction spot, but that primary is already a cattle call on the Republican side (five candidate committees and counting). In addition to that, Crandall's seatmate in the House is Republican Kirk Adams, the Speaker of the House.

Something tells me that Adams isn't likely to want to go from the top position in one chamber to a rank-and-file position in the other (OK, assuming he successfully made the transition, he'd probably rate at least a committee chair). At least, not until he is forced to do so by term limits.

As such, Crandall seems likely to be the one to try to move to the Senate, possibly to help set up a statewide run of some sort in 2014.

Look for more such announcements, from both sides of the aisle and in both chambers, as the turn of the year approaches.

Later...

Barnes: the transcript

Well, apparently the staff at the lege was in a hurry to wrap up before the holiday, so the video archives from yesterday's session of the House is already posted on the website. Click on the "video" link for "11/23/2009 - House Third Reading - Special Session 11/23/09".

Here's the "unofficial" transcript, "unofficial" meaning "transcribed by a blogger with a newfound respect for court reporters" (note: it's not perfect, I left out a lot of the umms and pauses and the like) (Note2: "B" = Barnes, "A" = House Speaker Kirk Adams, and "S" = Representative Kyrsten Sinema):

[37:35 mark]

B: My light is lit, sir.

A: Please explain your vote.

Thank you mr. speaker. there's a couple of things...when I walked in here the first thing that I heard was that there weren't any Republicans that were against this thing...and..umm...I think maybe the other side should learn to count, Maybe it will help them with their budget problems.

As far as I could see, all the Republicans were there. The second thing that bothered me was when Mr. Ableser said that there was no bipartisanship here. I guess he forgot that he's a member of the Environment Committee and that I've helped push his bills through...I've helped push Representative McGuire's bills through and it has nothing to do with the fact that they're Democrats that I did it and it has nothing to do with the fact that other people are Republicans that I do that.

If it's a good bill, it goes, if it's not a good bill it doesn't go.

And this is the same thing with this. If it's good, it goes.

Now is this the best? No, it's far from the best.

[Start of the juicy stuff at the 38:45 mark]

And you say that "well you can't touch education".

When I went to school, we had the superintendant of schools and that was it. and then, for the school itself, it was the principal and the assistant principal was the English teacher, and when the principal wasn't there a substitute came in and took the English teacher's place and she became the principal.

[volume rising]

Now, you have the superintendant, the deputy superintendant, the superintendant of communications, the superintendant of sports, the superintendant of government affairs.

Ya got the principal, the assistant principal, the assistant to the assistant principal, the principal of recess, the principal of discipline, the principal of sports, and I'm sure unless we got a bisexual teacher somewhere, there's probably a principal of the girls restrooms and a principal of the boys restrooms.

[39:38]

And that bothers me, because I'm telling you that's not...[muffled]...padding the books...

[interrupted for a point of order from Rep. Sinema]

A: Mr. Barnes, point of order. Ms.Sinema, your point.

S: Impugning. I think, lack of decorum. Something inappropriate. Please keep your comments to the bill and not to people's orientation. Thank you.

B: I'm sorry, I didn't hear what she said sir.

A: Mr. Barnes, she would like you to keep your comments to the bill. Please proceed.

B: She wanted me to keep what?

A: Your comments to the bill.

B: I think this IS THE COMMENTS TO THE BILL! IS THERE NOT ANYTHING IN THERE ABOUT EDUCATION CUTS?!? WHAT'S THE MATTER? DON'T YOU READ THE BILLS BEFORE YOU START VOTING ON THEM?!?

It is a part of the bill. And now I'll tell you something, it's gonna happen again and it's gonna happen again and it's gonna happen again and I don't know where it's gonna stop. But you think it's in trouble now, you wait! Because if we don't solve all of the problems this year, which I doubt if we will, we got three times as many next year.

Somewhere, somewhere down the line, that thing is going to break. and then...I tell ya, one of the school districts came in and talked to me and said {mocking tone} "you can't vote against the school problems because we need the budgets, we can't solve them."

And I says "lookit", I says "quit putting pressure on me, I got enough pressure, I'm not against education. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for education."

And he says "but we can't take any cuts." I says "now wait a minute." I says
"I tell you what". "why don't we just let the state go bankrupt and let a trustee come in that's not...you can't vote on a trustee...the trustee comes in and he decides who's gonna take the cuts.

"Oh no no no, you can't do that!"

I says "yes we can, and maybe we should."

The transcript doesn't really capture the nuance and flavor of Barnes' rant. I heartily recommend that those who are interested view the video for themselves.

Those that don't live in AZ's LD7 will find themselves laughing their butts off and having something to be grateful for this Thanksgiving holiday; those that live in Barnes' district will find themselves crying this holiday.

BTW - Le Templar at the EV Tribune points out here that Barnes' bankruptcy scheme isn't feasible or even legal here.

Update - The AZ Capitol Times has posted the video on YouTube.

Ray Barnes: making Sylvia Allen look like an intellectual stalwart

The video isn't up yet, but the reports are (Tedski at R-Cubed here; Jen at Mindless Mumblings of a Martyr Mom here).

State Representative Ray Barnes (R-LD7) had a meltdown of epic proportions during Monday's meeting of the House of Representatives.

He started by talking about how during the good ol' days when he went to school and there was just a principal, with an English teacher serving as assistant principal. Now, there are vice prinicipals of discipline and gym class and whatever, including separate vice principals for the boys and girls' restrooms, separate unless they've found a bisexual principal, then that person could supervise both restrooms.

None of this is an exact quote (and won't be until the video of the meeting is posted), but I'm not making this up.

Barnes' rant was jaw-droppingly ignorant to the point of embarassing me as an Arizonan.

He actually has made State Senator Sylvia Allen of "the Earth is 6000 years old" fame look like a member of the intellectual elites.

A somewhat surprising accomplishment for someone heretofore best known for some rather Neanderthal attitudes toward women.

Live blogging the House special session

3:17 - House sets up sine die committee to inform Senate that its work is done. House in recess.

3:16 - Bill passes 51 -4.

3:16 - Barnes going now. He may be what Antenori looks like in 30 years or so.

3:15 - Antenori still going.

3:13 - Antenori going after the Tucson City Council over Rio Nuevo. What does this have to do with anything?

3:09 - Getting Democratic support on this one. The few "no" votes seem to be from Rs.

3:07 - SB1003 up.

3:06 - Farley says Dems ready to negotiate and work with Rs, just as soon as Rs are actually ready to work with the Ds.

3:05 - Speaker Adams criticizes Dems for not supporting "cuts-only." Bill passes 35 - 20.

3:02 - Carl Seel offers to "re-educate" the House on how much money K-12 has to spare. Nice choice of words there, Comrade Carl. (Sorry, I couldn't resist. :)) )

3:01 - They're still at it on SB1002.

2:49 - SB1002 up.

2:47 - Barnes states that unless there is a bisexual teacher somewhere, schools now have separate principals for both the boys restrooms and the girls restrooms.

He's yelling now.

I seriously believe that he may have had a beer or two at lunch. Or maybe three or four. :)

OK, I think that he's sloshed.

Drunk or sober though, he's definitely the most entertaining member of the House today.

2:45 -Passes with 35 votes. Ray Barnes excoriates Ed Ableser for saying that bipartisanship doesn't exist in the lege.

2;43 - Murphy states that tax cuts aren't the problem, and fewer tax cuts would have made the deficit worse. Newspeak, Republican-style.

2:42 - Still at it.

2:33 - Blathering still continuing. Antenori at bat now. Wants to cut taxes on business to raise revenue.

2:28 - Rep. Lesko is bemoaning the fact that Dems haven't supported any budget cuts, blaming them the lack of bipartisanship.

2:25 - OK, he's covering it at length. :)

2:23 - Now Rep. Farley is covering the same ground.

2:20 - Rep. Sinema calls "cuts-only" approach "foolhardy".

2:18 - SB1001 substituted for HB2001. Not going to be unanimous.

2:17 - Passes 53 - 0. Bill conveyed back to the Senate.

2:16 - This is going to pass unanimously, but they are still gabbing.

2:14 - Approps chair Kavanagh says that the fix will come up during the next regular session.

2:11 - Had to step away for a few minutes. Substituting the measures that the Senate passed for the identical House measures. Currently on SB1004, repealing the anti-deficiency statutes. (An actual fix is tentatively planned for the next special session.)

Live blogging the Senate's special session

1:48 - Senate recessed.

1:47 - Passes with 16 votes. Over to the House.

1:46 - Sylvia Allen says that a tax hike was imposed because the state equalization tax was permanently repealed.

1:45 - Cheuvront argues against the "cuts-only" mentality of the Rs in the lege.

1:44 - Gould voting no because agencies can raise fees.

1:42 - States that AZ lost over 13000 jobs from Motorola because of taxes. As a former Motorolan, I can state that is utter BS. For over 15 years, Motorola has been run by people who would rather buy or rent other people's tech R&D and license out the manufacture of their products. Actual development and manufacturing is too "old school" for the MBA types who have supplanted the engineers at the top of MOT.

Which is a big reason why MOT nothing more than a marketing company these days.

Taxes in AZ had nothing to do with it.

Not that I'm still a little ticked off by it all. :)

1:40 - Gray still talking. Criticizing an ASU research project, as well as a U of A project, both funded with stimulus funds.

1:30 - SB1002. Linda Gray explaining her vote. Using time to criticize the federal stimulus.

1:37 - Voting on SB1001. Verschoor explaining his "concerns" over agency fee hikes, but will support the bill. Passes with 16 votes.

1:35 - Gould complaining about ADOT buying cones to block off rest areas. That money would buy a lot of toilet paper.

Verschoor apologizes for not being present Thursday, and more importantly, not letting his colleagues know why.

1:33 - Attendance. 27 present, 1 absent, 2 excused.

1:32 - Session starting. Prayer and pledge time.

1:30 - The mic is open. Burns says they are waiting for Sylvia Allen. Oops.

1:28 - Senate President Bob Burns makes an appearance.

1:27 - There's some activity on the floor of the Senate, activity that even includes actual senators milling around. The meeting should start shortly.

The Arizona State Senate: The cameras are on, but no one is at work

Kind of like "the lights are on, but nobody's home," only applied to an entire caucus instead of just one person.

It's 11:24 a.m. Do you know where your senators are? Cuz they sure ain't working on the budget...

According to one source (info more than an hour old at this point), Bob Burns had been working on Albert Hale to get him to cross over, but given the absences today, odds are the Rs are going to need the support of one Dem.

Blowing sands, blowing smoke - the lege's schedule for today

OK - the tentative schedule for the day at the lege is a Senate floor session starting at 10 a.m. (and given that it is after 10 now and there's no sign of activity, it's probably not going to start on time, if at all.

Then, assuming success of some sort in the Senate (and the standards for "success" are getting pretty loose there), there is a House session scheduled for 1 p.m.

Tedski at Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion reports that the Senate Rs will be down a couple of more votes as the holiday approaches and senators have other things to attend to that may be more interesting than the never-ending budget mess.

Like, ya know, family and stuff.

More later...

10;22 - There's some activity on the Senate floor, but no Senators yet. Perhaps there will be something definite to report by 10;45...

Time for a certain classless coward to step up and take responsibility for his action

No, this isn't a political post, unless you consider anonymous violence and utter thuggishness to be valid forms of political expression.

And while I've got a pretty low opinion of the AZGOP (as any regular reader already knows :) ), but even I don't think they are quite this bad.

Last night's football game between U of A and the University of Oregon was an exciting one that took two overtimes to determine a winner.

One fan took umbrage at the Ducks' victory, and instead of heckling a player (you know, one of the people who at least were involved in the outcome) he chose to vent his ire on a random victim, in this case, a cheerleader.

From the Arizona Daily Star -

University of Arizona police are still searching for the person who hit a University of Oregon cheerleader in the head with a water bottle at the end of last night's football game.

The Oregon cheerleader, Katelynn Johnson, a senior, was taken to an area hospital for minor injuries and was scheduled to be released this morning, Sgt. Juan Alvarez of the UA Police Department said.

If the person who threw the bottle that hit Ms. Johnson has even a shred of class (and given the events that form the basis of this post, that seems unlikely), he will step forward and accept responsibility for his actions.

According to the article, any criminal charges could range from disorderly conduct to aggravated assault, though it would seem likely that if the bottle thrower steps up, it will work in his favor (as would the fact that Ms. Johnson's injuries are minor ones).

Until such time as he *does* step up, however, all of the people of U of A, Tucson, and even the entire state will (deservedly) wear the "classless boors" designation because one person was upset of the outcome of a game.


Boo freakin' hoo. Get over it; it's only a game.


P.S. - while I criticized the thrower for anonymously going after a cheerleader instead of directly confronting one of the players, that would still be wholly inappropriate (and pretty stupid, too).

It would, however, be less cowardly.

Bob Burns admitting that Democrats actually exist?

And that maybe they matter?

Next, you'll be telling me that Russell Pearce is going to resign his position, convert to Catholicism and become a priest so that he can minister to the poorest of the poor in Mexico. All as penance for the bile that he has spewed and the pain that he has caused in his career as a politician.

So you say that those two things will never come to pass - Russell "National Alliance" Pearce will never change his nativist ways, and Marszałek Senatu Bob Burns (thanks Tedski!) will never move beyond his partisan nature?

Well, you are half right - Pearce isn't changing any time soon...or probably any time ever.

On the other hand, Bob Burns has cracked open the door of bipartisanship.

From AZCentral.com -

Senate President Bob Burns said he was seeking Democratic votes as he tries to wrap up a special legislative session that went into unexpected overtime last week.

"We need at least four members of the Democratic caucus," Burns, R-Peoria, said late last week, after discussing the state budget at the annual tax watchdog luncheon of the Arizona Tax Research Association. He said he and other legislative leaders planned to spend the weekend looking for those votes.

I have no specific info regarding which Dems Burns is targeting, much less what, if anything, he is offering in return, but I've got a couple of phone calls out.

My off the cuff guesses:

Targeting - Richard Miranda, Jorge Luis Garcia, Ken Cheuvront, and Albert Hale.

- They targeted Miranda before, Garcia has indicated in the past that he has been interested in dealing, Cheuvront is actually pretty conservative for someone who is a gay Democrat (OK, if he wasn't gay he'd probably be a leader of the Chamber of Commerce wing of the AZGOP, but the AZGOP hates gay people nearly as much as they hate Mexicans), and what Hale wants (see the linked article) isn't going to cost the state anything (the R's are against it because it benefits Native Americans, and for no other reason).

Offering - Not a hell of a lot. Burns has too much political capital invested in his previous plan of passing a budget with only R votes. In addition, too many members of the R caucuses in the House and the Senate have made the same investment, and they will be loathe to sign off on any real compromises.

It'll be interesting to see if enough of the Dems are willing to sell their souls in exchange for the equivalent of meaningless but shiny baubles and trinkets.

If not, and right now I'm betting on "not," it will be even more interesting to see if Burns and Adams can convince enough of their caucuses that a little bipartisanship beats holding a special session meeting on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Later...

The coming week...

As usual, all info gathered from the websites of the relevent political bodies/agencies, except where noted, and subject to change without notice...


This week's schedule is pretty sparse due to the holiday on Thursday, though there will be some excitement at the Arizona legislature early in the week.


...The U.S. House and Senate are in recess this week. I was going to offer a quip about the turkeys having some turkey this week (or something else equally trite), but since the Senate Dems held together long enough to break a Republican filibuster on health care reform, I'll be nice. :)


...The Arizona legislature will meet again on Monday to attempt to pass the latest budget patch. They may get something done, or they may not. I'm not betting on this one. If it doesn't get done this week, a patch may have to wait until the next special session, rumored to be taking place early next month.

It's already looking like the next regular session of the lege (starting in January) will see the ideologues of the Arizona chapter of the Flat Earth Society running roughshod over pragmatism - the first two House bill proposals are already posted on the lege's website. HB2001 would establish the "I didn't pay enough fund" for taxpayers to voluntarily pay more in taxes; HCR2001 would proclaim Arizona's sovereignty from federal laws under the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (aka the "we're going to ignore any federal law that we want to" Act).

Those measures are sponsored or cosponsored by 46 and 47 of the most extreme members of the lege GOP caucus.

Of course, given that there are only 53 GOPers in the lege, that should tell you something about how nutty this bunch is.


...The Arizona Corporation Commission doesn't have any full meetings scheduled this week, but they do have an abbreviated hearing schedule (nothing on Thursday, Friday, or next Monday).


...The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors has a special meeting on tap for Monday at 1 p.m. The highlight looks to be a settlement/surrender in the case of the lawsuits (here and here) brought by County Treasurer Charles Hoskins. Some background from AZCentral.com here. No word on if the results of the latest audit of the Treasurer's office played a part in the settlement.


...On Monday, the Board of Directors of the Maricopa Integrated Health System has two meetings on tap - an executive session at noon and a regular meeting at 1 p.m. The exec session will focus mostly on employment issues.


...On Tuesday, the Governing Board of the Maricopa County Community College District will hold a regular meeting. The agenda is light. There is an executive session (contracts and compensation) followed by an open meeting that is almost entirely consent agenda stuff.

In short, they should be adjourned by 7:30 p.m. And given that it is a holiday week and there is another meeting scheduled for early December, they may just make it on this one.


...The Tempe City Council isn't scheduled to meet this week, but their brief Council Calendar is available here.


...The Scottsdale City Council isn't scheduled to meet this week either, but their Community Meeting Notice is here.


Not scheduled to meet this week: Arizona Board of Regents, Citizens Clean Elections Commission, Board of Directors of the Central Arizona Project.

Rodney Glassman getting closer to a Senate seat

...A nativist winger knocking off McCain in the Republican primary would immediately make Democrat Rodney Glassman a serious threat to win next year's race for the U.S. Senate, if not the outright favorite.

According to the latest Rasmussen Reports poll -

Senator John McCain’s future in the U.S. Senate may be a little less assured than previously thought.

A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely 2010 Republican Primary voters in Arizona finds the longtime incumbent in a virtual tie with potential challenger J.D. Hayworth. McCain earns 45% of the vote, while Hayworth picks up 43%.

Rasmussen's toplines are here.

A third candidate, Chris Simcox (founder of the anti-immigrant vigilante group The Minutemen) is polling at 4%. That would seem to help Hayworth, as it is probably safe to presume that in the event he drops out, his supporters would gravitate to Hayworth, but Simcox' 4% is within the margin of error. In other words, he could help Hayworth...or he could have no support at all.

While the comments on the AZ Republic's website and in the Republican blogosphere are somewhat jubilant at the thought of the nativist Hayworth unseating McCain, they should note -

The poll surveyed likely voters in the Republican primary, not in the general election.

John McCain has proven all but untouchable in general elections thus far (though Tucson City Councilman Glassman could do well enough to make McCain actually work this time around), Hayworth is anything but untouchable in a general election, as Tempe's Harry Mitchell proved in 2006.

To the GOP's "more conservative than thou" types -


Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.


Yeah, I know it's a cliche, but it works here. :)

Time to negotiate *for* the lege's Republicans

Yup, time to contact some local hospitals and see if we can get a group rate for 53 admissions for "cranio-rectal dislodgement surgery."

And if you can't figure out what that's a euphemism for, you aren't enough of a wiseass to enjoy this blog. :)

From AZCentral.com -

What was expected to be a quick special session to cut $300 million from the state budget collapsed early Thursday afternoon when the Republicans fell one vote short of the needed majority.

The Senate adjourned until Monday, when it is expected there will be enough members present to pass the cuts.

The drama turned on Sen. Thayer Verschoor, R-Gilbert, who was missing as the vote neared on a bill that would cut $300 million from education and health and welfare spending. Verschoor was widely believed to support the cuts, but he objected to other policy shifts the Legislature was making in its special session.

Verschoor skipped the vote because of language that allows state agencies to raise fees to offset some of the lege's cuts.

Yay.

In other news, Republican Ron Gould voted against the budget, because he votes against everything, and Chuck Gray voted against it so that he could move to reconsider the vote. He did, the motion was approved, and they'll be back to "try, try again" on Monday.

The House didn't vote on anything on Thursday.

See you all Monday...