Posted: Thursday, July 24, 2003 12:00 am
The gloves have come off in the partisan slugfest in Salem, and the cheap shots and counter-claims are flying.
In dueling letters Tuesday, Gov. Ted Kulongski and House Speaker Karen Minnis traded personal jabs. The public fight - complete with the posting of the letters on each of their Web sites - knocked out Monday's fleeting hearts-and-flowers session. Both Democrats and Republicans said then that they'd made progress on the largest issues before them: school funding.
That reconciliation was over by Tuesday, when an exasperated Minnis announced that she would hurry up the pace of the session by running budget bills for the 2003-05 biennium out of the house special committee on the budget, saying, "The Democrats are simply not living in reality."
There is a gap of about $150 million between the Democratic and Republican versions of the budget, centered on the amount for schools and human services and how to raise additional revenue.
Kulongoski responded Tuesday with a letter to Minnis that read in part, "It is unfortunate that you and the Republicans have decided to abandon bipartisan budget efforts at this juncture. Your actions today ensure that this process - already slow - will be reduced to a glacial pace … which will ensure that we will have the longest legislative session on record."
Minnis fired back: "I am insulted by the condescending and demeaning tone of your letter. The Legislature is an equal branch of government and does not require lecturing from the Executive.
" … Governor, what this building has so desperately lacked is consistent leadership from your office."
None of this, of course, has moved us any closer to a budget, especially with this week's announcement that the state's powerful unions intend to challenge any meaningful PERS reform.
All of this has Oregonians feeling like family members overhearing a vicious family quarrel. It's disquieting. Its outcome has a direct affect on us, and we have limited power to make them stop, behave and work together, the way quarreling families inevitably have to do. The faster our divided Capitol gets back on speaking terms, the better.