Making Things Worse
by digby
Who could have ever imagined that electing a criminal tea partier to the highest office in the state would cause problems?
Rick Scott, the conservative Republican billionaire who plucked the governor’s job from the party establishment in November with $73 million of his own money and the backing of the Tea Party, vowed during his campaign to run the troubled state like a corporate chief executive (which he was) and not a politician (which he proudly says he is not).
And now it has become a problem, some of his fellow Republicans say.
“The governor doesn’t understand there is a State Constitution and that we have three branches of government,” said State Senator Mike Fasano, a Republican from New Port Richey who upset Mr. Scott with rough handling of his staff during a testy committee hearing. “They are talking about the attitude that he is still the C.E.O. of his former health care corporation, and that is not going to work in this state, in Tallahassee, in my district. The people believe in three branches of government.”
Republican lawmakers in Florida were hoping for a smoother transition. Instead, they say, they got top-down management from a political novice.
With the Legislature convening on Tuesday for a potentially arduous two-month session that is bound to usher in major cuts in spending and jobs and radical changes to education, pensions, unemployment benefits and Medicaid, the governor will be tested on a broader, more public scale. Florida faces an estimated $3.6 billion budget shortfall this year and has a stubborn 12 percent unemployment rate.
“I think there have been some understandable growing pains because government doesn’t function like a corporation,” said Speaker Dean Cannon, a Republican from central Florida, taking a more measured tone than Mr. Fasano.
Read the whole article. Basically, he believes that he is now a monarch and can do anything he wants without any input from the other electe4d leaders. And here’s a little taste of what he plans to do:
Mr. Scott is single-minded in his plans to shake up Florida and create jobs. He wants to create a business-friendly environment, chop up the bureaucracy, peel away regulations and hand out $1.7 billion in tax cuts for corporations and property owners in the first year of his budget. Privatizing Medicaid and prisons is also high on the agenda.
In his budget proposal, Mr. Scott is seeking to eliminate more than 8,500 state jobs, including in the Corrections and Health Departments. His budget for the state’s already lean public schools is $1.75 billion less than this year’s, mostly because federal stimulus money dried up.
And he wants to cut costs in Florida’s pension fund by requiring more than 600,000 government workers, including police officers, teachers, firefighters, judges and retirees, to contribute 5 percent to their retirement. New employees would use plans similar to a 401(k). This has angered state workers, who have gone without a general raise since 2006. They plan large demonstrations around Florida on Tuesday.
Maybe this is what Floridians wanted, but I doubt it. On the other hand, it’s what they should have expected. Rick Scott may be the looniest, most dishonest, powerful elected official in the country. And it was easy to see that going in. Stay tuned.
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