On a day full of fast-moving developments at the General Assembly, it’s a shame that more mainstream news media coverage won’t be devoted to a press conference conducted by House Democrats this afternoon.
At the event, House Minority Leader Joe Hackney, along with Representatives Marvin Lucas, Rick Glazier and others spelled out in painful detail just how disastrous House GOP budget cuts will be in education. The lawmakers explained how the cuts would cost the state literally tens of thousands of jobs and set it back decades.
The savings to be reaped from these cuts? One quarter per day – 25 cents. That’s how much money, the legislators demonstrated, that the average family will save as the result of the Republicans’ plan to use the state budget to cut the state sales tax rather than allow the current rate to remain in place.
Perhaps the best one-liner from the event, however, occurred as reporters pressed the lawmakers on the question of the Democrats apparent obsession with spending and money. A reporter noted that Republicans were for making do with less and worrying less about money.
To which Rep. Glazier dryly noted in response: “It’s funny how the people who say money doesn’t matter are the people who have it.”
