“First the verdict, then the trial,” says the Queen of
Hearts in Lewis Caroll’s “Through the Looking Glass.”
First the veto, then the discussion, said Governor Dannel
Malloy following a Democratic Party reversal of fortune.
After being shunted off to a dark corner during Malloy’s two
terms in office, the Governor resolutely refusing to allow Republicans any
decisive part in budget negotiations, Republicans on September 15 finally
earned a place at the table. In fact, they stole the table when a Republican designed budget had passed in both chambers of the General Assembly.
Republican House leader Themis Klarides to Speaker of the
House Joe Aresimowicz following passage of the Republican budget: "Now I know how you guys feel."
Following an ancient script, Democratic leaders successfully
sequestered Republicans during budget negotiations and proceeded to hammer out
differences with Malloy, previously having successfully affirmed protracted contract
negotiations between Malloy and state employee union representatives that were,
as expected, favorable to union interests. The governor, invested with plenary
powers after Democratic leaders in the General Assembly had failed to present a
timely budget, then tormented
municipalities with the prospect of reduced state education funding, some
suppose as political leverage deployed
against legislators who might resist a Democratic budget when Democrats finally
got around to presenting a budget. Progressive Democrats in the General Assembly
discussed a barrel full of tax opportunities: tolls, a tax on cell phones, a
tax on gold-plated hedge fund operators, an inheritance tax on dead farmers
that would prevent them from passing their assets to their children, an
increase in the sales tax, the elimination of deductions and tax credits,
backdoor tax increases -- even though early on Malloy had laid down an inflexible marker: Democrats
must not lead with tax increases.
The progressive Democrat dominated General Assembly did little else but lead with tax increases. Both the Governor and Democratic decision makers in the General
Assembly expected a leader-whipped legislature to pass an invisible budget
no one had seen, possibly because it did not exist. The whipping failed, and
not because Democratic whips failed to draw blood on Democratic backs.
Following passage of the Republican budget, Malloy’s
strategy has now changed. His tone -- that of a harpy screeching through a
megaphone -- never changes. The Governor deftly bowed to the importance of the
legislative branch of government in a democratic republic: “…this [the Republican budget] is a document
that was passed out of the General Assembly, and I owe it to the legislators
who voted for it, and to the people of Connecticut, to give it a full vetting.”
Then he brought down the hammer on
legislative skulls: “… I understand enough about the bill already to know that
I will veto it.”
Truly, Republicans understand enough about Malloy after two
terms in office to know that he would veto their budget. Neither, they also
suspect, will he incorporate into a union friendly Democrat budget any
Republican ideas that, should they be adopted, would put an end to future
deficits and future raids on so called “dedicated funds.” The notion that Democrats should recover legislative
authority over budgets by setting state-union salaries and benefits through
statute rather than contracts is beyond the ken of union bought Democrats. And the mere hint of incorporating into future budgets PERMANENT, LONG-TERM
cuts in spending raises the hair on the necks of union intimidated Democrat legislators.
Democrats have resisted such solutions to the problem of
recurring budget deficits because they wish to exploit the deficits so they may
permanently increase spending. That is what has been happening in Connecticut
for roughly a half century. And it was not Malloy’s predecessors who prolonged
Connecticut’s recession by imposing on taxpayers the largest and the
second largest tax increases in state history.
The two Democratic leaders in the General Assembly,
both now belatedly calling for bipartisan solutions, are right on script. Speaker
of the House Joe Aresimowicz, the gatekeeper who effectively prevented
Republicans from bringing their ideas to the floor of the greatest deliberative
body in Connecticut, regards the budget affirmed by both Houses of the General Assembly
as “unworkable.” Ditto President Pro Tem of the State Senate Martin Looney.
Surely, the Republican budget bill is not more unworkable
than the non-budget the Democrat dominated House did not present to the General
Assembly. Where was the much vaunted bipartisanship from July, when the General
Assembly concluded its proceeding for the biennium, to the present? And how is
bipartisanship advanced when both Democrat leaders of the General Assembly regard
the budget passed in their chambers as unworkable?
When Malloy says he will veto a Republican budget that passed muster with both Houses of the General Assembly, but he is never-the-less
willing to take seriously the concerns of Republicans, how can he possibly mean
anything other than this: I do not regard the Republican budget as a serious
measure, never mind that it passed two Democrat dominated chambers; nor do I
regard the legislative majority that affirmed the budget bill as a serious legislative
body – because the budget bill that passed is not my bill? Furthermore, it will
be unworkable because I am determined to veto it.
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