Reporting from the floor of the California State Senate…….
After over two months the Senate Democrats finally decided to put up the budget for a vote. FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME.
Senator Perata just finished railing at the governor – then saying he was through with negotiating with us. The problem is – he never started negotiating with us in the first place.
Senate Republican Leader Dave Cogdill has asked time and time again to sit down and work out a budget deal. Perata just doesn’t respond.
The Senate Democrats have taken the tack of working out a "deal" with the governor – which includes a tax increase – then having the governor "pick off" the two weakest Republican Senators.
They’re doing this because its a tried and true tradition – it’s exactly what they did last year. And didn’t that work out well….. Remember last year? We were called "terrorists", "whackos" and "extremists" – then locked in the chambers overnight to try and force us into crumbling.
All of this because we just wanted to cut $750 million out of a bloated budget. Go figure.
The budget will fail – there are no Republican votes for this today. No tax increases today.
At least we had a vote. Frankly, I thought the Democrats forgot we needed a budget. They waited two months to begin negotiations.
Hopefully, now we will all get serious and start working together to pass a responsible budget that won’t raise taxes or let prisoners go free or do any other of the crazy stuff the Democrats are proposing today.
The vote will be in a few moments…….