Just off the transom from State GOP Communications Director Hector Barajas:
Assembly Speaker Fabian Nùñez continues his disingenuous rhetoric regarding the budget delay, even though a budget deal has been reached. Perhaps the Speaker had a lapse in memory, as he seems to have forgetten that he left California’s needy high and dry while a budget deal was still in the works.
For all of his political posturing, Speaker Nùñez has failed to mention that, when he left Sacramento for his European summer vacation, he not only left the wheels of the budget process still in motion, he also consequently left thousands of Californians at risk of losing their Medi-Care coverage and hundreds of summer programs at risk of being reduced or eliminated. Upon returning to California, Speaker Nùñez was seen traveling from one photo-op to another, holding press conferences in an effort to pressure Republicans to vote for a debt-laden budget and invoking the plight of the residents he himself abandoned for the beaches of Greece.
The speaker’s newfound concern for patients’ health and the quality of care at health facilities is commendable, but regrettably belated. These concerns, expressed in front of cameras and journalists, are things that should have been considered, discussed, and debated months ago, not 50 days into the new fiscal year. Patients who faced the prospect of losing their health coverage shamefully became political pawns for the Assembly Speaker.
With a projected $5 billion deficit for the 2008 budget, the rhetoric should be laid to rest and discussion on balancing the upcoming budget should commence immediately. But given the Speaker’s history of wanting to actively prolong California’s budget crises, more of the same can be expected from Nùñez.