Thursday, June 12, 2014

Craziness and nuttiness in the Virginia legislature


Virginia leaders may vote on stripped-down budget

"The budget plan rolled out Wednesday at a meeting of the House Appropriations Committee calls for holding most state spending at current levels to account for a projected budget shortfall that has swelled in recent weeks to $1.5 billion. The few exceptions are mostly in areas where the state is bound by certain legal or financial commitments, such as increasing school funding to match rising enrollment.

But most new spending that had been in earlier House or Senate budget plans — raises for teachers and state employees, expanded pre-kindergarten programs, inflation adjustments for hospitals — is gone. “There’s going to be a lot for everyone not to like tomorrow night,” S. Chris Jones (R-Suffolk), the committee’s chairman, said at a gathering with reporters afterward. He said he was just glad that the plan does not call for cuts from existing spending levels."

In week’s political tumult, Terry McAuliffe is long-term loser and Md. status quo is winner

"The legislature is set to approve a budget. Financial turmoil is averted.
In addition, a perfect excuse has fallen in the Democrats’ lap to explain why McAuliffe failed to broaden Medicaid as promised. It was all the fault of the conniving GOP and that quitter, that renegade, that back stabber Phillip Puckett. 
In fact, the Republican-dominated House of Delegates wasn’t going to approve Medicaid expansion, anyway. McAuliffe should say a quiet prayer of thanks to Puckett for giving him an easy out."
Man, now we can look back on the governorships of Jim Gilmore and Mark Warner and think of them as the good ol' days in the Old Dominion.



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