This quote from House Speaker Kirk Adams, R-Mesa, is just plain funny, but it also illustrates a fundamental problem for Gov. Jan Brewer in getting a statewide sales tax election:
“I’m telling you, unless we would have hypnotized people, we did everything that we could to convince people to support the governor’s proposal for the tax referral,” Adams said, according to Capitol Media Services. “And short of the body snatchers returning, the votes were simply not there.”
I don’t see where Brewer finds those votes when the Legislature returns in special session Monday to reconsider the $8.4 billion budget that she has whacked with line-item vetoes. Democrats have unified against the sales tax proposal, believing voting for it would validate a budget written entirely by Republicans, even though the additional revenues would mitigate the worst of the budget cuts.
Meanwhile, most Republicans have signed the “no tax pledge,” and the group behind that pledge has informed lawmakers in writing that it considers referring a proposed sales tax increase to the voters (instead of the Legislature just adopting it) to be a violation of that pledge. In many Republican-dominated legislative districts, that pledge figures prominently in primaries.
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Their primaries aren’t going to matter because the Dem’s will trounce the R’s next year after this sign of complete incompetence. No foresight. Don’t refer a tax voter because you’re beholden to someone’s pledge and don’t want to lose power and control- and because of that you lose power and control.
They also informed lawmakers that in signing the pledge, they forfeited all rights to their left kidney and agreed to massage the bunions of GOP leaders on a “as needed” basis..