Still counting

“It’s early,” I said.

Survey of state Senate finds narrow majority oppose repeal read the headline across the front page of today’s Baltimore Sun.

So I sought to calm the waters at the start of our weekly strategy meeting on death penalty repeal. I also noted that vote counts are fluid before the public hearing on a bill. It’s tomorrow in the Senate.

Prior to our discussion, I spoke to someone who had been the chief legislative officer (lobbyist) for a previous Governor. “When you held that job,” I asked him, “didn’t the Sun run a story mid-session saying that the Administration’s agenda was in deep trouble with the General Assembly?”

You are right and they were wrong, he replied. I had a similar conversation with another former chief legislative officer.

Later in the day, I told someone in the Governor’s Office that a story written days before the Special Session of 2007 would have said that there wasn’t enough support to pass a slots bill or tax increases. However, when the roll was called, the votes were there.

After I recounted that conversation to an Annapolis veteran, he made the valid point that how a legislator makes a decision on the death penalty is not the same as with slots.

We’re still counting.

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“It’s the end of welfare reform.”

I didn’t say that. Joe Scarborough did on MSNBC this morning.

I checked with a bipartisan expert on the issue, Sheri Steisel of the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Her response: “It's from the Heritage Foundation. (http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/wm2287.cfm) It's totally wrong. Ron Haskins, the leading Republican staffer on welfare reform, agrees that in an economic downturn, the federal government needs to increase spending to meet the case load demand.

"There is no change in work requirements or time limits on eligibility for cash assistance. Those are the key elements of the welfare reform Congress enacted in 1996. There’s no new entitlement.”

So much for transparency, accountability, and accuracy from the loyal opposition.