Monday, February 02, 2009

Gonzo Lawmakers - Day 10

A daily recap of the Georgia Public Broadcasting show "Lawmakers". The show airs weekdays at 7:00pm with a replay at 5:30am the following weekday.

* Session starts a new week today but first let's see how last week wrapped

* Everybody's present. A good start.

* HB 143 (extended the Property Relief Tax Grant for one year) passed the House. Rep. Stacy Abrams compares it to common law marriage. Wasn't common law marriage repealed years ago? There's a Republican talking about helping po' folks. Laws have mercy.

* Senate Judiciary Committee stripped the Public Defenders Standards Council's power. It was a close one: 6-4. It also moves the Council under the Governor. The Public Defenders say this muddies the separation of powers, Republican Chair Preston Smith says the Attorney General has given it a green light. And what is the root of all this? Brian Nichols. How long will his specter haunt us?

* WHOOPS! Premature camera switch! Thank god Nwandi wasn't picking her nose.

* The Governor wants to split DHR into three agencies. It's the largest in the state. Split off will be Health and Behavioral Health (think mental hospitals). Seems to make sense.

* Minoo! (I don't think there have been any live shots this episode. Couldn't corral the reporters to stick around on a Friday? Instead we're getting lots of voice overs and power point bullet lists)

* Casey Time! Which means Transportation time! Bottom line Casey supports a regional T-SPLOST as opposed to the House's state wide T-SPLOST.

* More property relief grant debate. God what a mess.

* Dubose Porter talking about education. The big players are getting more face time. The Democrats really want to make hay with "local control". Dubose is getting wonky. I know the details are important but can't we get a little passion?

* "Georgia Hospital Association Education & Awareness Day". Ahhhh they want to talk about Governor Perdue's weird hospital tax. And based on the dress of the Guv's spokesman, Friday is casual day in the big man's office.

* Week in review time. Let's review this week in Gonzo. Transportation. Property Taxes. Live shots. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

* Nan Orrock is speaking about the "Pearl of Wisdom" campaign for cervical cancer awareness. Since Renee Unterrman is standing next to her and I doubt those two agree on anything, I'm going to safely call this bi-partisan.

* More voice over and power points. Seriously, everyone but Nwandi and Dave must have hauled ass.

* State of the Judiciary this wednesday. Watch it online.

* Relatively smooth show. That's a wrap!

3 comments:

Jen said...

Ahem.

All I have to say is that is does make any sense to have prosecutors in the same branch as defense attorneys?

And.. does it make any sense to have a GPDSC director who has no criminal experience?

Whatever.

griftdrift said...

I was hoping you would drop by. So my gut reaction that this is a mistake is correct?

Jen said...

I actually have mixed feelings about it. I expect this to be fleshed out soon by a fellow Georgia PD with a blog and the discussion will ensue over there. Will tell you when it happens.