And the halo goes to Doyle

by folkbum

The other day, I called on the Democrats in the State Senate to pull Healthy Wisconsin from their budget proposal. Today, they saw the light. This was followed, of course, moments later by the Assembly Republicans' stammering "well, um, no deal anyway, hosers!" (I'm paraphrasing.)

Here you've got the Senate giving up the showpiece of their budget in order to get the willofthepeople taken care of, and the Republicans insist on playing the piecemeal game that just ends badly for the state.

It took me a minute to figure out what was going on--and, frankly, I'm a little surprised that the Republicans are going along with this--and it's that the Dems are going to let Jim Doyle play the hero:

Encouraged by the progress made on a new budget this week, Gov. Jim Doyle today called on legislative leaders to meet with him and his top aides Monday morning to step up negotiations on the budget.

Doyle said he had asked leaders of Senate Democrats and Assembly Republicans to convene at the executive residence at 9 a.m. Monday to "work as long as it takes to get a budget enacted in this state." [. . .]

"The Legislature must continue to compromise, continue to work night and day and complete the job they were elected to do," Doyle said.

Well, whatever. As long as we get a budget.

And the Republicans lose.