| Here's the thing: The Republicans understand that there have to be some additional revenues. They know that even they couldn't come up with the full $25 Billion in cuts in any way that could possibly help them politically. But, on the other side, they are terrified of their own base.
This is where it gets interesting. Sen. Bob Dutton, the Republican Leader in the Senate asked the Legislative Counsel if there is any way for the Democrats to put something on the ballot on their own, sans the 2/3 majority. Now, Dutton would probably tell you out in public that this is just to stop the tax hikes or something like that. But, you have to think that Dutton was secretly hoping that the Democrats could do the dirty work while the Republicans could maintain their ideological purity by never voting for anything that possibly resembles an increase in taxes.
Speaker Perez, for his part, doesn't seem to be taking the bait, and has cast that aside right from the get-go:
Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez said Wednesday that he has no intention of sidestepping Republicans by trying to place a tax-extension measure on the June ballot by a simple majority vote of the Legislature.
Pérez downplayed a legislative counsel's opinion, sought by Senate Republican leader Bob Dutton, that indicated such a measure could be placed before voters without the support of GOP lawmakers, under narrow circumstances.
"No," Pérez said flatly when asked if he is entertaining such a plan for the tax measure proposed by Gov. Jerry Brown to raise $11 billion for the fiscal year that ends June 30, 2012.
"There is not a single legal analysis that I think holds any water that says we could legitimately put this question before voters on a simple majority vote," Pérez told the Sacramento Press Club. (SacBee)
I'll admit, I'm a bit split on this move. From a practical standpoint, I'm a bit skeptical that the Democrats will, in fact, be able to lure enough GOP votes. Keeping open the majority vote measure as a way to whip some GOP votes into making some sort of deal seems to make some sense.
But, guessing at the Speaker's logic here, in order to pass this thing at the ballot, you are probably going to need at least nominal GOP support. If you have them running around saying how awful this package is, it could create a pretty dicey situation for the actual election.
At any rate, despite the Speaker's protests, I would still not count out the concept of a majority vote measure quite yet. |
