Legislative leaders and Gov. Paul LePage have gotten themselves into a bad place. For fear of angering the governor, Republican lawmakers took a secret vote to uphold his veto of a couple of budget items. This has made them look weak. Rather than repeat this debacle in May, Republican leaders and the governor need to find a spending compromise that both can support.
Earlier this month, the Senate unanimously passed a supplemental budget. It passed the House by a lopsided 105-30 vote. A day later, Gov. LePage used the line-item veto — for the first time in its 17-year existence — to strike two items from the budget.
House and Senate rules say each chamber “shall act” on the line-item vetoes within five days. Republican leaders say they did act by asking their members if they wanted to return to Augusta. The majority said no.
When pressed, the Senate president’s office did provide the Bangor Daily News with a tally of which members said they were willing to come back to Augusta and which ones said no.
The speaker of the house declined to provide such a tally. Instead, in response to a Freedom of Access request from the Democratic Party, Speaker Bob Nutting put out a statement.
“My office used an anonymous poll, which is used frequently by both Republican and Democrat caucuses in other matters, such as electing caucus leaders,” he said in the statement.
But this wasn’t a caucus meeting, this was action required by the House rules regarding line-item vetoes. Legislative action can’t be done in secret.
Using “anonymous polls” to conduct legislative business is akin to a board of selectmen taking votes in executive session.
By declining to reconvene, Republican lawmakers allowed the governor’s vetoes on general assistance funding and money for psychiatric hospitals to stand. This makes the Republican leadership look weak. More so because they hid behind a nonpublic poll to let the veto go unchallenged despite the Legislature’s strong support for the spending plan.
The alternative was to make the governor look weak by overriding his veto.
Neither is a good outcome.
As for the Democrats, the events of recent days have given them reason to never trust their Republican counterparts. The general assistance funding that the governor struck from the budget was a hard-fought compromise. It took the members of the Appropriations Committee weeks to find language that was acceptable to all members of the panel. Once a compromise was reached, it was endorsed unanimously.
By not challenging the governor’s veto, Republicans have shown that such compromises — and the time and give-and-take that is needed to reach them — are wasted.
It all adds up to a toxic mix.
Republicans — because they control both houses and the governor’s office — must find a way out of this situation.
The Legislature resumes again in three weeks. The governor is still demanding big cuts to “welfare.” Republican leaders should look for ways to work with the governor to find reasonable common ground.
The alternative is another strong vote in support of a spending plan, only to be met with a veto. Lawmakers will then again have to decide — hopefully not in secret — whether to override it.
This is not a productive way to set policy or determine funding priorities.
Surprise, surprise, the fax machine is working. How else would the BDN be able to align themselves so perfectly with Democratic talking points? This type of blatant, biased writing makes me sick.
Oh stop the cowardly whining. The Republicans are just acting like water boy toadies for LePage and refusing to do their jobs. The peoples’ legislature voted overwhelmingly for this budget bill, and then the scaredy-cat Republicans don’t even dare to call their people back for REAL “action” on the vetoes, and they hide behind cowardly anonymous votes. They don’t dare to stand up as a co-equal branch of government and stand by their own votes. They have once again proven what a debacle they are for this state, and they will be CRUSHED in November at the voting booth. Bank on it. LePage and the Maine GOP under the leadership of that goofball Charlie Webster are one giant JOKE.
It’s the editorial page. It’s an opinion piece. That’s why it’s labeled this way, not as a news story. Bet you never say this when an editorial parrots the Republican talking points.
The problem is the back-stabbing Repubs! I don’t see anything wrong with reporting it. You must think that should be kept quiet too.
Isn’t that (back-stabbing) the republican way? Hush, hush, secrecy,back-room deals, lies,and favoritism, all led by the illustrious, greasy Lepage.
You mean like the backdoor dealings under Obama? I have news for you, both parties are at fault.
Deflection again. Nothing else in defense of your illeagally acting reps?
Yea, and you do not deflect with GB, suuuure
And how else do the Rs/Tea Party align themselves with ALEC, Nordquist, etc.
I try to give the Bangor Daily writers as much benefit of the doubt as possible, but this is unbelievably partisan to put in a regional paper like this. Shame on you.
What, specifically is partisan about the facts in the article?
The scare quotes around the word “welfare” is a nice touch.
The BDN, in part, wrote an article that exposes Republicans breaking the House rules by failing to “act” legislatively in response to the Governor’s line-item veto. Regardless of party affiliation, I think this is a critical point to illuminate. For me, I believe that the integrity of many legislators, whether R or D, is at stake. Isn’t that important??
Of course not. Modern day Republicans don’t care about integrity, just about results. Where are you, Margaret Chase Smith?
Just wondering what you consider partisan about the editorial ? Are you claming that Lepage hasn’t been partisan ? The Republicans haven’t been partisan ? The Democrats haven’t been partisan ? Anyone can claim that something or someone is partisan, Please explain yourself….. What point did the editorial make that would justify your claim of partisanship against the editor or the paper ?
It tells the truth.
and we all know that facts have a liberal bias.
To die-hard conservatives anyway.
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It’s an opinion piece. Look up the definition of “editorial” and “opinion.” And then see if the facts are correct. If they are, decide accordingly.
How would you have reported it differently?
Paul LePage’s decisions will jack up Bangor taxes, why shouldn’t this be in the BDN?
Speaking of partisan …
If the BDN was given a list of Republicans that secretly voted to return or not, where is it? I’m sure the voters would be interested to know.
The Governor did act with his line item veto. That is legal. The problem apparently is with the legislature not having the intestinal fortitude to do their job in an open and honest way. In fact they broke the rules of the legislature by refusing to act in open session. They did this in a cowardly way.
It sounds more and more like the DNC is also gaining shares in the BDN. The liberal BDN bias is sickening. LePage is doing a terrific job and the working people appreciate the good work he is doing. Go LePage!
He is not doing a terrific job, and this working person does not appreciate the way that he and this Legislature are doing the people’s business – behind closed doors and greatly influenced by corporate lobbyists in the form of ALEC legislation. It’s not liberal bias in the BDN to point out that the end never justifies the means. In this case, whatever trust we the people had in the Legislature to balance out LePage’s bullying tactics should be long gone.
Balancing state budgets, exposing government corruption (MTA, MSHA, DHHS) and increasing government accountability to the taxpayer are indeed terrific things. For anyone to think otherwise makes me wonder about their motives.
The need to question my motives rather than deal with the issues makes me wonder about your … integrity. As far as corruption goes, there have been no such findings at MSHA, and DHHS appears to be an issue of competence, not corruption. Which makes me wonder about your… cheerleading hyperbole. The past state budgets were all “balanced” too, by the way, just not on the backs of the poor and at the enrichment of the wealthy.
If $310,000 for a measly 1,000 square foot apartment building isn’t corruption, then I don’t know what is? Of course, Dale McCormick’s friends won the contracts, no corruption there, none at all.
If the state budgets were truly balanced, then why did LePage inherit a 4.5 billion dollar state pension deficit? Why does each Maine taxpayer owe $20,000 towards their share of the total state debt of 12.7 billion dollars? Perhaps those benefiting from the system and those that do not pay taxes call this balanced. However, a good dose of common sense calls this fiscal insanity. Thank God, we have LePage in office to fix 40 years of failed liberal policies and complete fiscal mismanagement. Go LePage!
Wait, John McKernan was a liberal? Jim Longley was a liberal?
Well they weren’t conservative. But they were heads of state who worked with democratic controlled legislatures, unlike when there’s a democrat head with an opposing legislature.
Yes, please, LePage. Go.
You notice how all investigation of Maine State Housing stopped as soon as McCormick resigned?
Yeah.
Not true – the OPEGA investigation is ongoing.
And with the ever-trustworthy LePoliquin at the helm, OPEGA will have a full-time job investigating MSHA.
Lectures on ethics from the party whose members stole toll money from the state for 20 years? Please. That’s a little too much to take. At least now the Democratic good old boys are ending up in jail, where they belong, instead of in the Legislature or as the governor’s buddy. The only problem is Republicans haven’t been able to clean house enough.
He inherited that Pension deficit like King before him and Baldacci before him. Every governor from Brennan forward has robbed, in some way, the pension fund. Either by taking money from it, a la McKernan (so much so that a people’s initivite passed a change to the State constitution to stop it from ever happening again), to merely not funding it a la Brennan, King, Baldacci. Not LePage’s fault, but his “fix” was more of the same, and ulitmately won’t fix it.
Creating budget shortfalls, then slashing to “balance the budget” is cowardice. Show me the business model that avoids income from the customers with the most to spend. Show me the family that sits at the kitchen table and says ” We don’t have enough money to pay the bills. I guess we need to reduce our income.”
Show me the business model that FORCES customers to spend a certain amount of money on products they don’t want.
Hey, Mainemajority, Budgets were balanced in previous administrations, too, and the Governor had nothing whatsoever to do with unearthing Paul Violette’s stealing from the Turnpike Authority. There has been disagreement about Housing Authority issues (like whether buildings ought to be handicapped accessible, built sustainably, and in urban areas near transportation instead of in inaccessible to public transportation rural areas), but notwithstanding Bruce Poliquin’s best efforts, these policy differences are not corruption by any reasonable person’s measure. It’s a little nervy for you to cite DHHS as an example of anything good. You say that corruption was discovered, but there is not a scintilla of evidence of it. This is more to the point: The Governor took out a whole layer of the top and mid level people in DHHS in an ideological purge, without understanding that he also wiped the agency clean of institutional meory of how things worked. He created the problem that we are now living with. Even worse, he and the DHHS Commissioner misled the legislature with bad numbers, knowing they were bad numbers, and led them to make cuts that were not warranted by the data.
Maine State budgets have been balanced every year for decades ever since it became a constitutional requirement. LePage submitted a budget which is now known to not be balanced because of incompetence and dishonesty by his administration.
The legislature will fix his mess in the next couple of weeks like they have been for months now. If they hadn’t been lied to in January by LePage and his staff, it would already be balanced.
LePage had absolutely nothing to do with the investigation and exposure of Paul Violette at the MTA. It was done completely and solely by the legislature and the investigation was started by Senator Dawn Hill D-York.
There is an investigation underway at MSHA, but again it is the legislature investigating, not LePage or anyone in his administration. By the way, nothing has been found or reported yet.
The corruption and incompetence being reported at DHHS is coming from the LePage administration itself.
LePage’s first budget was a half BILLION dollars higher than Baldacci’s last one. He has been growing state government.
Careful Tyke. You’re beginning to make sense. And common sense, more than any other single trait, is dangerous to the ALEC-type’s. They hate being called for what they are, namely closet facist’s who’s only goal is to “look out for the common good”. Please, gag me with a snowshovel ! Nutting and his bunch of MHPC and ALEC buddy’s are doing nothing more than trying to rig the vote on the Budget, that everyone has agreed to, to cause a crisis that they are gonna’ try to use as a way to come in, riding a supposed ‘White Horse’ and be seen as the Savior of Maine government from the Socialist horde of Democrat’s. Hey, we all saw the Rick Perry Show during the GOP Debate’s. Maine doesn’t need re-run’s to know a dud when we saw it on the 1st go ’round, do we ?
BREAKING: You don’t need an apostrophe for plurals.
For probably the 100th time:
LePage and the Republicans had nothing to do with the uncovering of the MTA scandal. That investigation was undertaken by OPEGA and started months before the elections.
There is no real credit due either party.
If we want to get common sense back into the public process, it has to start with the electorate. Less of this kind of knee-jerk, uninformed posting, and more thoughtful (and accurate) debate would be a great first step.
You’re half right; LePage doesn’t deserve credit, but Republicans in the Legislature absolutely do. When the initial OPEGA report uncovered some questionable spending, it was Republicans on the Government Oversight Committee who pushed for more investigation, uncovering the real criminal activity. It was dogged investigation by Republican legislators – and OPEGA at their request – that led to Violette’s resignation and prosecution, by the Republican Attorney General.
You cannot say that a Democratic Legislature would have been that responsible with the investigation. This was a case of Republicans uncovering Democratic corruption; that’s the simple truth, whether you want to admit it or not. Were the parties reversed, you’d be praising Democrats for uncovering Republican corruption.
Violette showed that Democrats cannot be trusted to run state government. If you want to go back to having public money embezzled, put them back in charge.
I can’t believe some of the idiotic comments on this thread from the whining liberals, let alone this ridiculously uninformed editorial. They can’t stand it that their “War on Maine” is starting to falter.
“war on Maine” cute.
Seems like the conservatives have their own war on Maine, telling everyone, nationwide, how bad Maine is.
Idiocy is not restricted to the liberals. I’ll agree that they make their contribution to the intellectual desert that these forums have become, but plenty of conservative stupidity appears out here.
For the record, I am a conservative, although much conservative posting does far more harm than good.
We all need to grow up.
I thought you people were “pro business”. Remember, BDN is a business, just like your FOX NEWS is.
I am pro business, but I also favor unbiased news reporting. Here is where the conflict lies with the LBDN.
“I am pro business, but I also favor unbiased news reporting.”
The only problem with your reasoning is that the article was not a news report. It was an editorial and was labeled as such.
EDITORIALS
Out of the veto morass
geesh, picky. picky.
you can’t expect a person to be blinded by ideology and still have attention to details, no matter how large and obvious, can you?
Conservaites are “picky” only when it suits their ownpurposes. In this case, accuracy is the better path. Learn from it.
One more time, “majority” it’s an OPINION piece. I know you can’t tell the difference from always watching FOX “news”, but there is a reason why it says in big black letters at the top of the page “OPINION.” That it contains facts to bolster the writer’s conclusion is distressing to you, I’m sure, but it’s allowed under the definition of “opinion.”
Once again, this is an editorial, not news reporting. However, editorials are written by analysis of the news, actions of government, etc. Much better job thasn Faux News.
We’ll see in November if people think LeBUFFOON is doing a “terrific” job. Enjoy your delusion while it can last, because it is going to come to a screeching halt this fall.
I agree. Go, LePage. Far, far away, never to be seen again.
So, if you believe that the DNC is “gaining shares in the BDN, then please explain how; by telling the TRUTH? I would say that you should know what the truth is, but the Republicans haven’t had any kind of relationship with the truth since Ronald Reagan was sworn in the first time.
As a working person, who pays taxes, I think he is doing a downright mediocre, at best, job. I commend him for the DV legislation he backed and for the conflict of interest bill he endorsed and got passed. That, however, is it. All the rest is ideological ALEC bills, that his admin doesn’t even have the smarts to alter, in any way, before presenting them to the floor.
Could you give me a link to the “ideological ALEC bills” ?
Thank you
You can find the links to ALEC on your own.
You’re Pfft2 also ?
Blindered at best, bald hyperbolic stereotpying at worst.
This is abominable and undemocratic behavior on the part of the Maine GOP. They love to shout “communist!” at Democrats but they’re the ones behaving like the Kremlin of old.
Yes, you’ve got it. The GOP does not belive in Democracy; it wants to be a dictatorship (sound familiar, Governor?). The GOP has turned into a tool for the religious right which would like nothing better than to see their dogmatic beliefs made into law.
“For fear of angering the governor, Republican lawmakers took a secret vote to uphold his veto of a couple of budget items.”
Simply not true. Republican lawmakers have NO fear of the governor. Also, the vote was not secret. There was no vote. It was a poll done by phone to see if they wanted to come in.
This editorial, which is eerily similar to the one in the Pingree Press Herald this weekend, is wrong on many counts and disturbingly irresponsible.
Vote or poll, does it really matter what they called it? The answer is no: you’re quibbling and it is pathetic. This kind of smoke-and-mirrors tactic by a GOP totally out of touch is what is disturbing.
You are intentionally being obtuse. The issue will be dealt with at the scheduled session in a couple of weeks. Besides, I would suspect that, as usual, many legislators immediatly took off for vacation when session went into recess.
But that doesn’t matter to you. Nitpicking Republicans who have made incredible strides the past 2 years is all you can do. You insist on keeping Maine down. You insist on spending every tax penny you can get your hands on so long as you can continue to keep the Maine people down. The Maine poverty industry depends on you. This is the Democrats War on Maine people.
Republicans have made great strides? Right. Backwards, as usual.
“Poverty industry”? Please. Dwarfed by comparison with the R obfuscation industry.
You’re right. I just read the editorial at the Sentinel site. Same themes, some of the same wording. I guess the BDN is deciding to get their editorial content from the former employer of their new editorial page editor.
Facts would prove otherwise. Why would republicans who voted in huge numbers for this budget, not come back to vote on the veto’s, if they weren’t afraid of the Gov and his tantrums.
Anything they do in May won’t change the fact that the money they allotted in the supplemental budget, simply won’t be there where it was going to be.
By doing an anonymous poll (which is against the rules of this type of procedure) the Republicans didn’t show a lot of fortitude, and I think its going to really come back to bite them in Nov.
Afraid of his tantrums? Are you serious? Nevermind, yes, you are – you’re a Democrat.
Again, these two items can be addressed when we meet as scheduled in May. Why is that so hard for you. I know, it isn’t. You’re getting good traction from your ignorance.
If it sounds like a vote, acts like a vote, it is a vote. Quack!
Kind like Obama has done in Washingtong, oh I see.
I assume you have a specific ready example of the Maine Republican Party using the word “communist”, as you claimed.
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At the heart of this ridiculous situation is a crucial point that needs to be made and the editors hit it spot on.
The real crisis facing Maine and the nation is a political one. Democracy implies disagreement. In a diverse society, disagreement is inevitable. The effectiveness of our legislative process depends upon being able to reach agreement through give and take. It requires compromise.
When accepting a compromise, the clear understanding of the parties is that both sides are in agreement, otherwise the whole deal is off. In business negotiations there are often compromises which are tentative in nature. They are subject to the approval of a higher authority. If that compromise is modified, it becomes a counter-proposal.
Here, the counter-proposal has become law. By a secret poll. Without a public vote. Behind closed doors in the singularly least transparent public action of this session.
The Bangor Daily News has been kind with its assessment of the Republican Party leadership.
I expect that many of both sides agree with your post with the possible exception of the last sentence.
I assume you have been making the same point during the ObamaCare fiasco.
Considering how the BDN (or any of us) could have criticized the unconsitutional actions of the Republicans, they were indeed “kind”.
“By declining to reconvene, Republican lawmakers allowed the governor’s vetoes on general assistance funding and money for psychiatric hospitals to stand. This makes the Republican leadership look weak.”
Actually–it makes the republican leadership look crooked. This is called railroading, or might makes right. This is not democracy.
Actually it makes the Democrats look irrelevant.
Perhaps, until November. It remains crooked, railroading strong arm governance however. We, the voters will remember this little treason.
No more so than when a Democratic Congress rammed healthcare down the throats of the majority of Americans.
That was called Democracy by you. This isn’t? Welcome to politics 101.
Lest we forget, that republican ALSO voted for the healthcare bill, now they are backtracking to swoon the electoral base.
No Republican voted for the ACA in its final version. How soon we forget.
No. But they should have!
Do you have the roll call of that vote?
At least they voted in open session and all members had the opportunity to have their vote counted. Where in the Maine Constitution does it state that the party in power has the right to have anonymous votes among their own party and call it a day?
How can you compare the Congressional vote with what just occured in Augusta?
They jammed it in using budget reconciliation. Never before in the history of this country has such a major piece of social legislation been passed in this ill-considered way, without a single vote from the minority party.
The process stunk to high heaven, with the “Louisiana Purchase” and the “Cornhusker Kickback”. It was capped by a libelous effort to smear Tea Partiers with false accusations of hurling racial epiphets and spitting on legislators as they paraded around with Speaker Pelosi and her great big gavel. Shameful.
I am confident the Supreme Court will rule that ACA’s individual mandate is unconstitutional. When it does, we will have Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and Barack Obama to thank for setting any real progress on healthcare back at least four years.
At least the Republicans had the opportunity to speak and vote on ACA.
The topic of this editorial is the refusal of the Maine Republican/MHPC/ALEC/Tea Party to uphold the rules of the Legislature regarding Vetos’.
Smoke and mirrors (and untruths?).
And I find it interesting that within the letters for “veto,” is the solution, “vote” as in 11/6/2012.
Neither partyh is irrelevant, and any party that tries to render the other irrelevent, does so at its own peril.
Hahahaa Face it BDN you’ve been snookered.
Huh? The Rs are trying to “snooker” us.
Ethical behavior does not appear to be the strong suit for republican leaders.
So much for any semblance of transparency.
It’s quite the accomplishment that Maine Republicans can be so crooked in their secret dealings, and still retain the support of their more illiterate and obnoxious supporters !
Bingo! That is exactly how they’ve retained the support. They appeal to, attract, court, and woo those who are easily influenced-i.e. the sponge-brained teapartiers who soak up everything they’re told and never question anything.
Too bad they refuse to open the “ulterior motives” door.
You mean like the Democrats in their backdoor dealings in Washington, with Obamacare and a few other things.
Is that your only defense, weak at that? Deflection? We must have hit a nerve. Touche!
I wonder where deflection was learned.
This no way to run a State.
At the end of this legislative session, if the Tea Baggers are trying ram through legislation that is contrary to the public’s best interests(as most of it is), perhaps the democrats should play their own political game and pull off a Wisconsin disappearing act to thwart achieving a quorum and turn the tables on these republican game players. No quorum – no vote – no chance for Paulie to grandstand except to whine about the tit for tat.
My god, I hope that never happens. I truly do not want to witness a grown man’s head explode off his shoulders.
Yours or mine ?
November is coming faster that we think, it is time to get rid of the GOP legislature and put one in that is willing to work together. Of course this won’t happen until 2014 when LePage is shown the door!
He may take it voluntarily long before then, when he sees how little support he will have after 11/6/2012. Good riddance!
“Republicans — because they control both houses and the governor’s office — must find a way out of this situation.”
…not to worry, they’ll have plenty of help finding their way out in November.
True…and we’ll see what a “contribution” they make to Maine’s unemployment rate.
I wish LePage had used the line-item veto for MPBN. Read this…http://wot7.com/?p=14. More of the same.
This is like Deja vu….This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu….This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu….This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu….This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…This is like Deja vu…
If the US Senate does not have to obey the law and work on a budget than I see no reason for the Maine legislature to meet to act on this veto.
I wish LePage had used the line-item veto for MPBN. Read this…http://wot7.com/?p=14. More of the same.
Just as irresponsible.
As the budget compromise was being developed, was there an agreement or any discussion between the legislative leaders and the Governor, that the Governor would line item veto those sections that they found unpalatable?
Legislators choose to ignore Gov. LePage at their peril. He sent very clear signals for months that he would not continue to allow them to “kick the (budget) can down the road”. Search this newspaper’s website – you’ll find loads of these types of warnings.
As Matt Gagnon astutely points out, if King and Baldacci had not just played the Augusta “Go Along and Get Along” game and actually shown some spine by using the line-item veto power the people of Maine gave them, much of this budget crisis could have been avoided, or at least, its severity lessened.
Well done, Gov. LePage.
Boo Hoo, BDN.
And stand by, folks, as we kick Lepage’s ample can down the road in November, by making him an even lamer lame duck.
Such warnings have teeth only through subtrefuge and behind closed door deals.
It’s great how the Bangor Daily News is able to read people’s minds and tell their motivations. Brilliant! Well done!
Better than many of the commenters here.
The BDN is really advocating for a power grab from the Legislature. For some reason, anything passed with a strong majority is supposed to automatically get the governor’s signature. But that is not how our government is set up. The original intent of having an executive office was to act as a check on the Legislature. Kudos to LePage for acting like a true executive.
I talked to a couple legislators. They told me they didn’t want to come back into session. There are seventy-something R’s in the legislature. If the BDN finds that it is in the public’s need to know who voted which way, maybe they should do some investigative reporting and contact the legislators rather than whining in their editorial page that the leaders won’t hand them the news.
This can also be a heads-up to the legislature. Don’t pass important legislation at the midnight hour of the session. If you had sent this budget proposal to the governor three days earlier, his line-item veto would not have required calling the legislature back into session because you would still have been in session.
Finally, the Republican leadership has a good point: Why bother calling a special session, with all the attendant expenses, when the legislature will re-convene in a few weeks and can address the issues at hand then? The Democrats really do not help the compromising process by screeching foul every time they don’t get what they want.
No. Anything voted on with a strong majority is not “supposed to automatically get the Gov’s signature”, as there are plenty of bills with no governor’s signature on them. However, if the legislature backs something 100% in one of the houses and by a very large margin in the other, it begs the question. Why did they roll over so easily? After months of hammering out this budget that most R’s voted for, now its too much to ask that they fight for the bill they supported? Well. Apparently it was. But if they think people will forget their actions, they are sorely mistaken.
More like a childish tantrum, “No! I don’t want to do it! Even if I have to!”
“secret vote” Pretty lame reporting if one can even call it that. There was no vote,as member were called on the phone and asked what they wanted to do. As to the notion that the legislature is afraid of LePage, this is laughable also. LePage has this state on a path of fiscal sanity for once. Liberals will wail and cry chicken little about how the streets will be full of dying poor people,but,this will not come to pass. The line item veto,supported by a HUGE majority of Mainers is just what the doctor ordered.
A vote is a vote. And cite data for your HUGE majority (caps yours).
Being the cynical soul that I am, I have to wonder if this wasn’t a “backroom deal” made in advance.
Lepage: “This is how it will go. You guys (Republicans) agree to everything the Democrats want, including the General Assistance funding and the Mental Health funding. Then when it comes to my desk I’ll use that Line Item Veto thing to diallow those two items. You get to look good because you passed it, and I’ll take the heat. That way we both get what we want.”
Republican leadership: “We can’t do that. The same provision that allows you to veto it makes it mandatory for us to be recalled into session and act on the veto. THEN what are we going to do???”
Lepage: “Nope. Nothing says you have to be recalled into session and nothing says you have to vote on it. You can claim with a semi-straight face that you’ve polled your Senators and none of them find it necessary to come back. You still look good and I still take the heat. Remember, November is still six or seven months away and people will have forgotten all about this by then. As far as I’m concerned, MY election is 2 1/2 years away and what are the chances THIS will be an issue by then?”
I’m not sure which is sadder, the fact that this may have happened or my believing that it may have happened. I certainly wouldn’t put this past LePage. Would you?
Well, which is he? Dumb, bumbling etc etc … or super smart, clever, diabolical !!
LOL
He is “all of the above.” Quite a lethal combination.
Machievellian.
Yeah…because Robert Nutting is someone I would trust…..HA!
Historic gutlessness by the Speaker and the House and Senate Republicans. So many ” first-ever”s since LePage got in, almost all have been embarrassments.
Seems Wellenbach is the bigger morass
So, is this Tom Groening’s last biting editorial to show his more than left-leaning tendency?
Governor LePage is trying to do the right thing for the people of Maine–he had almost 40 years of out-of-control spending, borrowing, bond issues, etc. to contend with. The D’s were quoted most often in the articles as if they were still in control–and, yes, I believe that many of the R’s allowed that to happen, because they do not know how to lead in the race. The D’s who whine are responsible for the mess that our governor is trying to fix.
I don’t know what ails you liberals, don’t you understand,THERE IS NOT ENOUGH MONEY>
You ought to be giving the governor credit for trying to get our fiscal house in order.
I’m gettin tired of hearing there’s “not enough money” from wazoos who should know better. If LePudge rescinds his tax cuts for the wealthy the money is there. Geeesh.
I’m ashamed of the legislature of this state as they are unable to put their differances aside and work for the people who elected them; not to mention that the people are their BOSSES. The people have made statments by vote and because some one does’t like the results they start a partition to put the item back on a ballet (usualy on an off season vote !). As for welfare if it didn’t happen here send them back where they came from and let that state support them. Same thing with drugs (metadone) Stiffen up the qualifications for support. Thank You Bob Stratton
You are making quite an assumption that legislators appear weak because they upheld the veto- you don’t know their motivation. I think your Democratic bias is showing. What did you have to say about federal legislators voting to pass sweeping legislation by party vote and without even reading the bill?