Will any Republicans crack and allow a vote on taxes in June? That's what everyone in Sacramento is wondering, and the insiders I've talked to say they think it's an even bet. Without a couple of GOP votes, Gov. Brown and the Legislature won't have the two-thirds majority they need to put a measure before the voters that would stave of horrifying cuts.
But there's plenty of backroom intrigue: Calitics points out that
The Republicans understand that there have to be some additional revenues. They know that even they couldn't come up with the full $25 Billion in cuts in any way that could possibly help them politically. But, on the other side, they are terrified of their own base.
So what they're trying to do is force the Democrats to do it without a two-thirds majority. There are some tricky legal ways to maybe make that happen -- to place the measure on the ballot with a simply majority vote -- and it now looks as if the GOP is actually pushing that alternative. The idea: Accept taxes that they know the state needs -- but blame the Democrats for it and keep the no-new-taxes types happy.
And the Assembly speaker isn't going for it. From the Sacramento Bee:
"I know that Senator Dutton has suggested that there's a way for us to do this as a simple majority effort. Had I proposed it, the Republicans would have been up in arms, saying that I was trying to thwart the will of the public," Pérez said.
The Assembly speaker accused Republicans of "trying to abdicate their responsibility as elected officials" by suggesting that Democrats could decide the issue without Republican support.
Yep: That's exactly what they're doing.
The problem, of course, is that the Dems need the tax vote, too (and I think some of them actually care about the future of the state, which no Republicans do). Who's going to blink first?