budget

In the theater of politics, expedient and easy trumps realistic and necessary. That's why no one - especially not Governor Chris Gregoire - will be advocating for a Washington income tax anytime soon.

But bleach works too. Here's a quick, chemically stripped update on the status of political transparency in Washington state.

Dino Rossi responded to today's meeting of the Revenue Forecast Council that determined Washington would have a revenue decline of $167 million. He added that to past budget predictions and said the state would now have a $2.5 billion budget deficit in 2009. He also had some blunt words about Gregoire.

State revenue forecasts are down nearly $167 million, which means that one state government program in the $33 billion dollar state budget might be marginally cut.

Representatives Cathy McMorris Rodgers and Dave Reichert have gone kosher and sworn off the pork. Which sounds admirable but also correlates to their effectiveness rating, and will likely get them less goodwill than a couple of good projects for their districts would have. On the other side, Rep. Norm Dicks won Citizens Against Government Waste’s “April Porker of the Month” for trying to get the Air Force to buy from Boeing. What nerve!

Brad Shannon has a good piece today's Olympian detailing Governor Gergoire's budget, including which programs were funded and which were vetoed. Be sure to check out the righthand sidebar for a series of useful links to government websites with even more goods on the budget.