So Get 2/3

Speaker Fabian Nuñez participated in a conference call with California bloggers yesterday. I couldn't make it, but I think I would have hung up the phone after this line:

The budget that was approved by the Assembly was described by George Skelton as a Republican budget. He [Nunez] doesn't believe that. It's not the budget he would have liked for California, but we don't have the two-thirds power to pass a budget that he thinks would work, so he has to compromise.

So do something about it. Use this issue next year in every Republican's district. But that's not likely to happen.

There's this assumption that legislative seats in this state are somehow etched in stone. They're not, they're the result of a de facto non-aggression pact between the parties. This is why you never hear the CDP talking about legislative seats; in my heart of hearts, I don't believe they really WANT a 2/3 vote. Then they'd have too much responsibility for the state if something goes wrong. By having just short of the 2/3 requirement needed for budget and tax bills, they can slough off just enough responsibility on the Republicans to ensure their own jobs.

This is the game. It's a two-bit hustle and it's what you get when you have people running the California legislative majority who are more interested in maintaining their leadership than actually leading.

UPDATE: I should note that there was lip service toward eliminating the 2/3 requirement, which I'll believe approximately when I see it:

SPEAKER NUNEZ: A constitutional amendment that we'd have to put in front of the voters. We're clearly in a bad situation. 38 days late, a lot of people aren't getting paid. We need to use this scenario to demonstrate that the problem is the 2/3rds vote requirement. We're one of only 3 states that does this, and the ultra-conservatives are holding up the budget and they're demanding that I negotiate it, but the only thing that will come out of that is more cuts. And I'm not going to do that. The 2/3rds vote threshold is allowing the 10% minority to hold this up. And hopefully, we can be taken to a 55% or a simple majority budget, which we've tried before but didn't win. This isn't just the legislature holding it up. This is the ultra-conservative Republicans in the Senate.

Eliminating 2/3 is an easy sell, but I think it requires 60% of the vote as a Constitutional amendment, which won't be easy. And again, I'm willing to bet that the energy toward this will magically dissipate once there's a budget. It's one of those things that people grumble about in times of crisis, and then promptly forget. Because the truth is that some of the leadership see that requirement as a GOOD thing.