Sunday, February 24, 2008
All money is politics
Dan Radmacher
Recent columns
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- Virginia voted for gridlock on Tuesday
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- America should listen to this Cassandra
From the RoundTable blog
On the first day of class, my freshman political science professor gave students the most simple and accurate definition of politics I've ever heard: "Politics is who gets what."
By that definition, the lament of State Senate Finance Chairman Charles Colgan, D-Prince William, about last week's dust-up with Senate Republicans makes no sense: "We have now decided to make this a political budget, a political vote."
If politics is who gets what, the General Assembly does nothing more political than craft the state budget.
This is only my second time through the biennial budget process in Virginia, so I wasn't shocked when Republicans on the Finance Committee broke what is apparently a long-standing tradition of passing out the budget unanimously.
But Colgan and others were incensed. "When the Republicans were in the majority and we were in the minority, you know we stuck with you through thick and thin. Never once did we waver," Colgan shouted during a floor speech.
Editorial writer Elizabeth Strother, who's been around Virginia politics a lot longer than I have, explained that the tradition has been for partisan differences to be put aside in the budget-writing process. Senators actually attempted to work together to do what was in the best interests of the commonwealth without worrying about scoring political points.
That's a noble ideal, and apparently it helped put the brakes on many potentially disastrous budget proposals. But it was unrealistic for Democrats to expect Senate Republicans to sign onto a budget far closer to Gov. Tim Kaine's proposal than the House Republican version it will need to be reconciled with.
As Senate Minority Leader Thomas K. Norment, R-James City, said, "This is not our budget."
For the first time in a long time, control of the General Assembly is split between the parties. That makes the budget dance all the more difficult.
Republicans were asked to vote for a statewide gas tax -- anathema to their party. They were asked to vote for a larger draw-down from the state's rainy day fund than many Republicans and some Democrats think prudent. They were asked to vote for spending that reflect the governor's priorities, not their own.
A unanimous vote would have given the Senate more leverage when the budget goes to committee, but, honestly, why would Senate Republicans want to do that?
State budgets are easier when taxes are flowing and the General Assembly is under one party's control. But when there isn't a lot of revenue to go around and when both houses don't agree who it ought to go to, it's a lot harder to agree about who gets what.
It was naïve for Senate Democrats to assume that Senate Republicans would just roll over under these circumstances.
Who knows? Maybe Monday's dust-up was all just for show. The demagoguery was certainly flying thick enough, with Democrats accusing Republicans of targeting 4-year-olds and Republicans bemoaning "the most dramatic draw-down in the history of this commonwealth of the rainy-day fund" -- though the fund was only established in the '90s.
I like the idea of our elected representatives taking off their partisan blinders when they work on the budget. But from what I've seen, the Senate Republicans' objections were based on genuine and reasonable differences of opinion, not blind party loyalty.
Democrats may believe those objections are wrongheaded, and they can attempt to debate the merits of their own approach. But in fighting for their priorities and their fiscal approach, Senate Republicans are only doing what they were elected to do.
I have been in Virginia long enough to understand the substantive difference between moderate Republicans in the Senate and their more ideological and hard-headed brethren in the House.
If the revolt in the Senate Finance Committee signaled a move from that tradition, it would be worth lamenting.
But to me it looks more like Republicans were simply trying to be heard and do what they can from their minority position to affect the budget.
That's simply politics.
Radmacher is the editorial page editor of The Roanoke Times.
