Arizona: Carolyn Allen

The Arizona Senate has canceled budget hearings for this Thursday since they can't even round up enough Republican votes to support the harsh cuts advocated by KookyKon leadership.

But as Random Musings. points out, Republicans in the legislature must consider Scottsdale home turf, since they have chosen to hold hearings there for two consecutive weeks in a row. Considering that Scottsdale Republican legislators Carolyn Allen and Michelle Reagan don't support Republican leadership's cretinous cuts, you'd think they'd want to spread out a little more (perhaps Mesa or Sun City where the hardcore KonservaKooks live...).

So show up and let the governor and East Valley mayors know that you don't supporting gutting education and health care in Arizona so that big corporations can get property tax cuts.

by David Safier

Lena Saradnik, who was the LD-26 Rep until she had to step aside for health reasons, is always outspoken, but she really lets fly in an Explorer guest column, Tucson-area Republicans failing test. Her subject isn't education cuts. It's the $22.5 million cut to Science Foundation Arizona, which could cost Arizona $85 million in matching funds.

She blames three R's from this area -- Antenori, Gowan and Stevens -- for pushing the cuts. But she doesn't stop there.

Williams, she wrote, could have opposed the cuts in the House Appropriations Committee.

And as for Senators Melvin and Paton:

The 2009 budget bill (with the $22.5 cut to SFAz and education) passed in special session with only the minimum 16 Senate votes required for passage.

In a 16-13 decision that saw two Republicans defect to the "nay" side and one Democrat say "yea," the Senate voted in favor of permanently eliminating the statewide property tax.

A moratorium was placed on the tax in 2006, but that freeze is set to expire in January of 2009. Today's vote, along with the House's vote in March, means that if Gov. Janet Napolitano decides to sign the bill into law, the tax - estimated at $250 million annually - will be gone forever.