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had the only angle
based on fear, suggesting that the General Assembly
might last beyond 60 days.
Margaret
Edds of the Virginian-Pilot
used the déjà
vu meme, although her column might have been
titled, “Been there, they haven’t done that.”
With a hint of ennui, she noted, “In Richmond, what goes around comes around ...
and around ... and around.”
She listed 10 issues that have seemingly been
around forever without resolution, including tax
reform and guns in bars: “Before today’s
toddlers grow up, marry, have their own children,
and get elected to the legislature, it would be nice
to have several of these issues resolved.”
We’d
never forget old what’s his/her name, if not for Jeff
Schapiro of the Richmond
Times-Dispatch reminding us of the faces who
will be missing from this year’s gathering.
Virginia will have to soldier on without
ascerbic Sen. Leslie Byrne, D-Fairfax, and Del.
“Tommy, we hardly knew ye” Bolvin, R-Fairfax.
Most
creative use of well-worn angle came from A.
Barton Hinkle of the Times-Dispatch.
Hinkle translated buzzwords:
"Unmet
needs" and "structural imbalance" are
so much ambasterous ruptumacy. (It doesn't take a
creodontician to mortificate diaglutinative
beciforms that sound impressive but don't mean
jacandence.)
He
also offered advice to Assembly watchers:
Keep
the big picture in mind, especially when various
special interests begin urging legislators not to
"single out" their pet cause or
"balance the budget on the backs of" one
particular group. When multiple voices complain of
being singled out, it seems fair to conclude none of
them is.
Although
he didn’t cover it, Hinkle might have cautioned
against the angle of the Staunton
News-Leader’s Nelson
Graves. Does
the Assembly face tough choices?
Yes, but as Margaret Edds pointed out, they
can be put off for a long, long time.
Once
the session started, pundits returned to more
“nuts and bolts” analysis.
The politics of Wall Street and its possible
effect on Virginia’s Aaa bond rating led Schapiro to sketch a
“doomsday” scenario
of the state ending up without a budget and possibly
shutting the government down.
Edds looked at divisions
in the business community over Gov. Warner’s tax
plan and asked, “What’s the pro-business
position?” A
bellwether will come from the Virginia Chamber of
Commerce’s Board of Director’s meeting this
week.
Tax
Wars
The
op-ed pages and other outlets were thick with
competing commentaries on Gov. Warner’s tax plan
and the more ambitious plan offered by Sen. John
Chichester, R-Stafford.
Much of the bloviation was shrill.
Big-time
Northern Virginia
lobbyist John T. “Til” Hazel trashed
both Republicans and Gov. Warner in a Washington
Post piece, although he wrote before
Chichester
’s plan was announced. “Deny and pretend are the
hallmarks of Virginia's government today,” he
concluded.
Club
for Growth leaders Stephen Moore and Peter Ferrara,
writing in the Washington Times, threatened
Republican legislators who might vote for the Warner
or Chichester
plans. Del.
Kirk Cox, R-Colonial Heights, was scathing
in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, saying,
"The Governor has offered an Alice-in-Wonderland
rationale that insults the people's intelligence.”
Blogger Ben
Domenech simply called Governor Warner a
“liar.”
On
the pro-tax side, Steven
Pearlstein of the Washington
Post called Chichester
a “hero” and the Republican analysis of
Warner’s plan “junk science.”
Pearlstein’s colleague at the Post,
Marc
Fisher, made Gov. Warner and Senator Chichester
his “Yay of the Day” for having “Woken up and
realized that it is not possible to pretend forever
that cutting taxes and increasing spending are comfy
bedmates.” He
liked the Warner plan because it is “A real stab
at reforming the tax code to put more of the burden
on the wealthy, to move toward the good and
righteous policy of taxing the hell out of tobacco,
and to create a more realistic approach to state
finances.”
Dependable
pro-tax pundit Gordon Morse used his Daily
Press column to blast
“free lunch populists” for causing
“venerated” Virginia
universities to move toward privatization.
In the Washington
Post, Morse
called Chichester’s plan “A well-thought-out proposal that will
be fiercely resisted.”
He rightly points to an Achilles heel:
Ask
your average hard-core tax-cutter about specific
spending cuts and you get a blank stare and a
trembling lower lip. That is particularly so in
Virginia because the drivers of state spending
growth -- nursing home care (via Medicaid), property
tax relief and public education -- do not lend
themselves to easy, risk-free slashing.
Your
State Employees at Work
University
presidents and state employees Alan Merten of George
Mason and Paul Trible of Christopher Newport had op-eds
in the Times-Dispatch
and the Daily
Press, respectively, calling for more state
funding in higher education.
According to Merten,
“The Governor has put forward a reasonable
proposal. His cards are on the table. It's time for
the other players to call or fold.”
Trible,
chairman of the newly formed Foundation for
Virginia, an organization lobbying for more funding,
claimed, “We are not committed to any partisan
agenda.”
Economic
Development — Who Knew?
Those
who work in economic development rarely find their
work discussed beyond vague platitudes.
It was refreshing, therefore, to see Del.
Preston Bryant, (R, Lynchburg), use his Roanoke
Times column
to relate economic development to the overall tax
and budget debate, plus talk knowledgeably about
individual programs and agencies.
Bryant noted the slashed budgets of the
Governor’s Opportunity Fund (42 percent), the
Department of Business Assistance (43 percent), and
the Virginia Tourism Authority (42 percent) since
2001. Although
he didn’t address the possibility that some of the
cuts might have been warranted — if Governor’s
Opportunity Fund dollars were pared from companies
that might cut and run, like John Deere did in James
City County, for example — Bryant raised a good
point for those who would “grow” Virginia’s
way out of budget difficulties:
This
is not to say that if we simply invest in a few
economic development initiatives all our ills will
be cured and we can chuck tax reform. No, that’s
not the case.
But
it is to say that economic development is at the
heart of the debate going on over the strength of
Virginia’s recovery and how far it’ll take us.
There should be a certain recognition that the
benefits derived from such things as the GOF,
business assistance programs, and top-notch tourism
marketing just may be that extra bit of oomph needed
to push Virginia’s economy beyond heights it
otherwise might achieve by default.
The
Marshall Conundrum
Bob
Gibson of the Daily
Progress obsessively
follows the work of conservative social activist
Del. Bob Marshall, R-Manassas. This week, Gibson said of Marshall, “His efforts
to enshrine his Roman Catholic beliefs about sex and
marriage are becoming more and more the talk of the
House.” Surprisingly,
though, as reported by Lessig
and Scanlon of the Daily
Press,
Marshall
opposed a measure allowing House of Delegates
sessions to be televised. Marshall asked the
bill’s sponsor, "Do you really want to give
someone like me even more media exposure?"
You
Can’t Have Mail
The
most interesting non-General Assembly commentary of
the week came from Becky
Dale in the Times-Dispatch.
Dale, a participant in Freedom of Information
Advisory Council workgroups, previewed a Virginia
Supreme Court case that will determine if e-mails
between local elected officials constitute an
illegal meeting forbidden under the Virginia Freedom
of Information Act. She
asks, “If our representatives cannot communicate
with each other except at scheduled meetings,
wouldn't such restrictions impair their First
Amendment rights?”
My
Legislation is Critical, but Yours ….
Taking
up a perennial General Assembly theme, Denise
Oppenhagen of the Potomac
News decried the “Many bills proposed for
inconsequential things,” such as special license
plates and naming a historic oyster fleet.
Apparently, “inconsequential” is in the eye of
the beholder. Bob
Gibson spent an entire Daily
Progress column celebrating a proposed
resolution from Del. Mitchell Van Yahres, D-Charlottesville, commemorating the notorious UVA Pep
Band on its 30 year anniversary.
--
January 19, 2004
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