ARNOLD: A crucial vote

Read Complete Article: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, 2009-02-17
Author: George Arnold

Review:
The tobacco tax bill has now passed both houses of the Legislature. The passage of a tax bill, requiring a three-fourths majority in each house, is being hailed-rightly so-as a huge accomplishment by Governor Mike Beebe. He has the reputation as the insider's insider for his own years in the Ledge. It appears that a few years away, as attorney general and now as governor, haven't diminished any of his legislative skills. The guv's still got the chops.

The vote in the House was right on the money. The tobacco bill needed 75 votes out of the House's 100 to pass. It got exactly that.

Among those voting against the bill were several legislators whose opposition could have been predicted and some who were genuine disappointments. Nobody would have expected Mark Martin of Prairie Grove and Jon Woods of Springdale to do better. They're incapable of it. They have been two of the most backward-looking representatives from Northwest Arkansas in recent history. Which is a sad distinction in a part of the state that has all too often sent short-sighted thumb-suckers to the Ledge.

Of course, those two voted against the bill.

But I'd have expected more from some other opponents.

Other opponents were no surprise. They're backbenchers, doing merely what their party expects: Duncan Baird of Lowell, Les Carnine and Debra Hobbs of Rogers, and Donna Hutchinson of Bella Vista.

May all these opponents have the decency to stay away when the medical school's opening is celebrated. They failed it at a critical moment.

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