It could have been worse, a lot worse. Yes, the inept Michigan
legislature made it two for three in missing deadlines but in the grand
scheme of things, it made no difference.
Two years ago they shut the government down for four hours and this
time it was just under two hours. No harm, no foul.
Nonetheless the Speaker of the House said, "I'm sorry we couldn't
get it done on time." In his defense, there were a lot of moving
parts. But as noted in this space recently, it's not that they
didn't't have a lot of time to move them into place. After all the
governor sent them her budget when he snow was flying last February.
Well having sat through this most recent budget ballet, the mighty
freshman caucus in the Michigan House, all forty-four of them, finally
got up the nerve to call for some reform.
Actually they swiped it from Gov. Granholm and Mike Bouchard who
swiped it from her. It's a plan to reduce the pay of lawmakers for
each day they don't have a budget in place by July first.
It's one of those no-brainer concepts that leaves you wondering,.
"Why haven't they been doing that all along?" Good question.
The answer is the guys who would be hurt, are the same guys who have
to approve it. 'Nuf said.
So give the freshies their due. They spoke with on
e voice. But
they could have had a bigger impact if they had gotten up last July, in
the middle of an elongated summer recess, and called out there elders
for fiddling while the budget remained unresolved.
Maybe next year when they go three for four.