The State Senate is in session right now.  You can watch at CalChannel, if you dare, or follow along with the live-tweeting at the #cabudget hashtag.

…Jeff Denham is completely grandstanding and trying to create a mailer for his Lt. Governor campaign.  He’s playing the Tough on Crime Wurlitzer by lashing out at the cut to the corrections budget.  Lying about the early release figures, too.  Chris Kelly must be getting a thrill up his leg.

UPDATES by Robert: Now Tom Harman, Republican of Huntington Beach, is parroting Denham’s claims on early release. This isn’t a budget debate, this is a GOP attack on Democrats.

…high drama on the first bill, AB 1, in the Senate. Although 4 Republicans voted Aye – Ashburn, Aanestad, Hollingsworth and Huff – 3 Dems have voted no, and they are Cedillo, Correa and Yee. DeSaulnier and Oropeza haven’t voted, and Maldonado could always flip his vote.

UPDATE by Dave: This is going to be a long night.  They couldn’t even get votes for the first provision, where the details of it haven’t even been determined?

…I’m out for a bit, so Robert will take you through the madness.

UPDATE by Robert: SoCal activists led by Marta Evry are asking folks to contact Oropeza’s office to ask her to vote no – (916) 651-4028.

…Abel Maldonado lays out the Zombie Death Cult strategy:

I’ve known dennis hollingsworth for 10 years and in every budget he would say “the longer we wait. The better it gets” what’s he think now

I’m guessing Maldonado and Zed aren’t exactly BFF.

…Oropeza shows up and votes Aye, and Strickland flips from No to Aye. One more yes vote and they’ll have passed the first of 31 budget bills. Gonna be a looooong night.

…Runner flips from No to Aye and the measure passes – but not before Mark DeSaulnier gets his No vote in. I’m pleased that DeSaulnier is voting no, but he needs to vote no from the outset and not sneak it in when it already has passed.

…Dave Cogdill is trying to push an amendment to end state funding of abortion. Dems are going to table this bullshit (and the amendment dies).

…health bill passes more easily, 29-11.

…AB 6, Medi-Cal cuts, pass 39-0.

…list of bills and their overall impact is here. Not all bills are available in full detail.

…after the drama on the first bill, the others are pretty much flying right by. The pattern is clear: All Dems vote yes, with usually just enough Repubs to get to the 2/3 level (27 votes). Republicans get their budget and then make Democrats vote for it. No Democrat has yet explained why the hell they are going along with this.

…right now they’re going after the low hanging fruit. The difficult bills – as @capitolweekly notes, the difficult ones are education, welfare, and local government – are being bypassed for now.

…AB 5, which passed 29-11, will cause about 775,000 children to lose their health care coverage. Senator Ducheny (Dem) said she hopes First 5 will come through with funds to save that program. In other words, the legislature is trying to enact Prop 1D even after voters rejected it on May 19.

…AB 22 will sell off some state property, including the OC Fairgrounds. Jeff Denham wants more property to be sold and hints Republicans will demand more sales the next time the legislature has to fix the budget (likely around November). All this is happening under a CEQA exemption agreed to in February, which is now gaining the status of precedent. Democrats are routinizing the giving away of the store. At least everyone voted for this – passed 39-0.

…Senate is on break for caucusing ahead of the tough votes. Assembly is passing the bills the Senate just passed.