Everyone else is doing such a great job on the budget that I don’t have much to say on that issue except what Mark Leno said. But I will note that this issue of budgetary intransigence by radical Republicans is about to go national, and how we’re dealing with it in California should be a lesson for the nation. I hope the Democrats are paying attention.
In his exit interview yesterday, Karl Rove tipped the hand the Republican strategy to resuscitate the President’s approval ratings.
Mr. Rove also said he expects the president’s approval rating to rise again, and that conditions in Iraq will improve as the U.S. military surge continues. He said he expects Democrats to be divided this fall in the battle over warrantless wiretapping, while the budget battle — and a series of presidential vetoes — should help Republicans gain an edge on spending restraint and taxes.
In fact, the President has been signaling this for a while, saying that he will veto any appropriations bill that doesn’t fall in line with his spending targets. Never mind that Presidents don’t set budget policy, or that Bush allowed massive spending increases when the Republicans were in charge of Congress. This is a play-to-the-base strategy to fire up conservatives by picking a massive fight with the Democrats over spending priorities. And it will essentially force the budget items to be decided by overriding the veto, with a… wait for it… 2/3 vote.
Now, there are a LOT more Republicans in Congress that would have to be pressured into accepting the budget than Republicans in the California Legislature. So I’m pessimistic about the strategy for squeezing them. I’m more interested in how we can win the rhetorical battle, and how we can learn from the California situation and empower the spine-challenged Democratic leadership from not caving on this one and doing the right thing.
While not many people are really watching the budget battle here, they most certainly will be watching the national battle and possible government shutdown. There will be reminiscenses of 1995 and Newt Gingrich’s shutdown, and caution from the Beltway media that Congress should learn from Gingrich’s mistake and pull back. That is absurd, since the President would be triggering the shutdown, and the budget priorities the Democrats are putting together are very much in line with what the public desires. Still, we are seeing in California that disgust with the budget stalemate reaches across party lines and sours the public mood on government overall. I believe this is the GOP strategy, to again make government a four-letter word and hope that their new “outsider” challengers (who will either be lobbyists or rich businessmen) can capitalize on it.
The key here, I think, it to define the tactic early, before Congress returns to session. Fabian Nunez, Don Perata, and Governor Schwarzenegger are now excoriating the Republican obstructionists for delaying vital services for Californians. This probably happened a few weeks late. The Republicans have dug in their heels and have no exit strategy; in fact, not exiting IS the strategy. To combat this on the national level, Nancy Pelosi and her leadership team need to be thinking about this now instead of reacting to the inevitable veto. They need to be warning Republicans in Congress that tying themselves to the President is committing political suicide, and that they’re part of Congress too, and approval ratings cut both ways (especially in the Senate, where 22 Republicans are up for re-election as opposed to just 12 Democrats). The best way to frame this is much like the Social Security debate. We need to start proudly defending the budget priorities and make it completely toxic to act against them.
Maybe some of my colleagues who are little more plugged into the state battle would like to chime in. How can we win this battle of ideas?
The pressure emanating from the Assembly, specifically the Speaker’s office, and from the Senator Perata and the rest of the Democratic Senators, and even Assembly Republicans has seemingly been insufficient to get the Republicans in the Senate to cast off the anti-government right wing of their party and their associated blogs. So, on Monday, Governor Schwarzenegger, finally, got into the action. I was going to title this something to do with muscles or terminating or something like that, but I’m all punned out. So, I’ll just have to settle for Arnold in battle mode.
On Monday, the Governator visited the districts of Sen. Abel Maldonado and Sen. Dave Cogdill. Arnold praised Maldonado, so we should expect to see the Governor in his Monterrey district if there is in fact a primary challenger in June. Cogdill seems an unlikely Senator to flip his vote in favor of the budget, so instead Arnold focused his musculatory power at Sen. Jeff Denham, a “moderate” (that’s a wee bit generous) whose district leans towards the middle. Denham, for his part, apparently didn’t appreciate the attention. From the LA Times:
“He should get a lot of heat,” Schwarzenegger said of Denham, prompting the healthcare clinic workers who were standing behind the governor to break into applause. “If you think of one person who can make the budget pass, Sen. Denham could do it. I hope everyone here today calls the senator. Call him. Say, ‘It is up to you now. You are our man.’ “
Denham later issued an angry written statement.
“Governor, let me repeat myself again, since perhaps you are not listening yet,” he wrote. “I will not be bullied, intimidated or pressured into voting for a budget with inflated revenues, unaccounted expenses or accounting gimmickry.” (LA Times 8/14/07)
Well, perhaps this is it. Perhaps this is where the rubber hist the road for the California GOP. The Democrats in the legislature seem unlikely to grant the GOP a reprieve in the form of an emergency spending measure, and the Republicans must now choose. Do they continue to rebuff the will of the vast majority of California voters? Will this be Arnold’s Last Stand? Is this Arnold really standing up the right wing of his party?
We discussed the possible immolation of a tenuous coalition on a thread a few days ago. More moderate, you might call them “BusinessReeps”, Republicans who are interested in, you know, plundering a large government bureaucracy might be feeling growing pains with the far-right Social Conservatives. It’s a tent built by Bush and Rove, and like much else of their doing it seems to be crumbling. And, like many things in politics, California seems to be leading the nation. The souring relationship between Schwarzenegger, the former poster boy of the GOP, and the far-right, could have long-lasting effects for political alignment both in California and the nation as a whole.
We might just be blogging a turning point in history right now. Keep your eyes on the ball, because where this one bounces, nobody knows.
(Welcome Speaker. As per our policy of bumping diaries of electeds, up this goes. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)
Earlier this week I visited the Birthing Project in Sacramento, a health clinic a few blocks away from the State Capitol. The Birthing Project staff works very hard on behalf of their clients to increase healthy pregnancies and successful births – something you’d think typically anti-choice Republican politicians would rhapsodize about. Instead, the Birthing Project and health clinics like it throughout California — who treat newborns and seniors and everyone in between — are in danger of closing their doors or eliminating services because a handful of Republican State Senators are refusing to provide one additional vote to pass the state budget.
With Senate Republicans holding out on the budget, state payments to keep clinics like the Birthing Project open stopped two weeks ago. For facilities that only get by on the skin of their teeth anyway, not getting these state funds is a huge blow. The harm caused to clinics like these is totally unnecessary and totally reversible — as soon as one more Republican member of the State Senate does his job, finds his conscience, and votes for the state budget.
The Assembly passed a budget that meets the constitutional requirement to be balanced back on July 20. That budget has a reserve of $3.4 billion – the highest in history and more than a billion dollars higher than what the Republican Governor proposed in his budget. The budget makes deep cuts in a number of areas that were not acceptable to Democrats, but, in the spirit of compromise and a responsible effort to enact a budget, we reluctantly agreed to these cuts.
More over the flip…
The balanced budget passed by Democrats and Republicans in the Assembly is supported by all Senate Democrats, Governor Schwarzenegger and one Republican Senator who broke ranks so Californians wouldn’t be harmed by an ongoing budget stalemate.
The constitution requires a two-thirds vote in each house of the legislature to pass a budget. In fact, two-thirds of the legislature does support the Assembly budget – but one more Republican vote in the Senate is needed for actual passage.
Senate Republicans are holding up the budget over totally unrelated issues, such as their desire to weaken CEQA, California’s premier environmental law, to benefit oil companies and developers. That’s not a budget issue (and it’s not going to happen).
Some of the Senate Republican holdouts did vote for last year’s budget, which is interesting given that the reserve last year was only $2.1 billion, compared to the $3.4 billion reserve in this budget. Last year’s budget had a “structural deficit” (the amount expenditures for a year exceed revenues collected in that year) of $6.9 billion compared to $699 million in this budget. Last year’s budget increased spending 9.2% while revenues were projected to grow only 1.7%. This budget does the opposite, limiting expenditure growth to 1.3% while revenues are projected to grow 6%.
This budget has been described, accurately, as a dream Republican budget. But as long as the “Gang of Fourteen” Republican holdouts in the Senate keep holding the budget hostage, it’s a nightmare for the Birthing Project and for other important programs that rely on state funding.
It’s time for all Californians to turn up the pressure on those 14 Senate Republicans to counteract the hyper-partisan pleas they are getting to hold out.
Like most Californians, the people at the Birthing Project don’t care what political web sites say. They don’t care who’s ahead in the Senate Republican leadership fight. They don’t care who’s running for Lt. Governor in 2010.
They just want to be able to do their jobs.
Which means one more Republican Senator needs to do his job, find his conscience, and vote for this responsible budget.
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I’m sitting at lunch yesterday when I see a certain Mark Leno staffer call me. I ignore it because I’m in the middle of a meeting for SF Young Dems. Another call. I ignore it again. He calls a third time, and I finally pick it up.
So, he invites me up to the debate in Rohnert Park between Sen. Migden and Asm. Leno in the Leno campaign bus. Aka, Asm. Leno’s car. So, I run back home and grab my computer (gotta have that, you know). I then run back onto MUNI to meet the staffer and the Assemblyman at a parking garage on Mission. All fun stuff, there.
On the way up, I take my conference call with the Speaker and half-listen. Now, I’m a pretty good multi-tasker, so I really had few problems actually getting both conversations. But one thing that I did miss was the line about this budget not being a Republican budget — referring to a line in a George Skelton story. But when you get down to it, this budget seems pretty darn close to a Republican budget. It’s hard to imagine a less progressive budget coming out of a Dem Legislature.
But, we continue driving, and I learn some cool things about the Assemblyman. Did you know that Mark Leno used to work for Art Garfunkel? Yup, the lesser-know half of Simon and Garfunkel. It’s true. Mark Leno helped Art Garfunkel to break out of S&G and skyrocket to superstardom. Oh, um, right…just flip it… Oh, and for more 2/3 goodness, check out Assemblyman Leno’s op-ed in the Chronicle.
So, we’re driving through the streets of the Rohnert Park area, pretty place, that Rohnert Park, and we keep going. The GPS tells us to keep going and make a right, and then three more rights. And guess what? We’re back on the street that we were on before, now trying to make a left with no stop light. It turns out we really could have just made a left (with the light) a few blocks before where we originally turned right, but, um, I guess the GPS likes fun drives through subdivisions. I dunno, but I just hope nothing like that picture happens to the Assemblyman, you know getting your car stuck in a tree by listening to GPS. Anyway, beyond the detour, no poor driving decisions were made. In fact, I’d be happy for Mr. Leno to chauffeur me every day.
We eventually get to the forum location, an old business park that is going to be converted into a housing development using smart growth and green technologies. I think that’s cool, but apparently nobody bothered to tell them that there is no frickin’ way to get there without sitting in traffic for like 2 hours. The roads are narrow, so that’s one issue, and the people will likely be commuting back to at least Santa Rosa, possibly San Francisco. That’s far. But, on the plus side, the development will be high-density, like 8 stories or something like that. You can get more info about Sonoma Mountain Village here. Ok, that’s all well and good…
When I got there, I was standing in the corner with my backpack when Senator Migden came up to me and asked if I was working for the enemy. I said no, I was a blogger who wrote about California politics and, um, unfortunately, nobody pays me. *sigh* It’s interesting, because I’ve kinda told her this like, I dunno, 10 times. I understand that she’s busy and meets a lot of people, but, um, can we cease the accusatory overtones? However, I will cut her some slack, as I did come out of Asm. Leno’s car. How would she know that I was trailing the Asm. for the blog, not because, um, he’s paying me.
So, the debate, was um, the debate. Senator Migden was peppy! She told the crowd to get some pep into you! Which, is always interesting, considering that this was, shall we say, a pretty mixed age crowd. But, they asked some good questions. Answers were what you would expect, you know, nothing too crazy, nothing to rock the boat really. You know, they both support affordable housing and Debra Bowen. The moderator praised them both before the concluding remarks for their good behavior. So Asm. Leno concluded with remarks about the importance of ethics, and how politicians must work to ensure that they do everything to obey laws and to conduct themselves as role models. Then, Sen. Migden kind of went, um, excited! Yes, she was very enthusiastic to talk about her car accident, and how it wasn’t her fault. To me, it seemed like someone doth protest too much.
The way home seemed a lot quicker. I’m guessing that’s because it was. Traffic clears out once you get past that magical 7 hour or whatever, and we cruised back home. The conversation was light and cheery. We talked about all the inside baseball stuff that so delights um, me, and like 3 other people. But, you know, I find it interesting. So there! Oh and he offered me a protein bar from his personal stash of protein bars. I declined, mostly because I had spent ten of the final twenty minutes stuffing my face with junk food. I tell you what, the No-name Woman’s Club really knows how to throw down a spread!
At the end of the evening, he dropped me off at my house. What service! Certainly, it was 2/3 of a blast.
It’s been just about two weeks since the Senate collapsed. Sad to say, that we might even be further away from a solution. Let’s look at this mess in a bullet format and try and make sense of it all.
14 Senators are holding up the budget until a majority of their far right cohort agrees to the deal, even though we only need one more vote. Essentially they are requiring that 74% of the legislature approves of the final budget. The two-thirds budget requirement is arcane as it is, but to require near unanimous consent is just absurd.
It is now clear that the Republican calls to change CEQA (see yesterday’s post) are central to their demands. That is absolutely a non-starter for the Democrats and the Governor. In the wake of the dustup over the CARB, Arnold is not exactly in a position to start weakening environmental laws without a huge backlash. I am not sure where the Republicans think they are going to get a lot of support for their pro-business, anti-green argument in both the Capitol and the public. California has a lot of Republicans, but a large percentage of them are environmentally friendly. The same cannot be said for the Republican Senators who are holding out. They are very much out of the mainstream, arguably even within their own party.
Senate Pro Tem Don Perata has declared that he will not take up any more legislation until the budget is passed, something Speaker Fabian Nunez quite rightly disagrees with. The Republicans would love it if the progressive legislation that the Democrats have on tap, like AB8 (health care reform) get scuttled. It would allow the Republicans to further undermine our system of government.
Arnold really looks impotent here. Nothing he has done has worked. His strategy of disengagement on the budget until the last minute has proven to be a bad one. He seriously miscalculated the intentions of his fellow Republicans. This stalemate has the ability to seriously undermine a lot of the work he has done in the last year to try and prove that he can unite both parties and pass landmark legislation. If this keeps up, it will damage his chances at the 2010 Senate race, if he was even thinking of running in the first place.
Nunez and Perata are now looking for any possible leverage points they can find on the hold-out Republicans. Nunez is declaring Republican legislative priorities DOA. Perata is stripping folks from committee assignments. Unfortunately, there is not much power they hold over them. Each day that passes is a victory for the ultra right-wing conservative Senators.
This week momentum has emerged to repeal the 2/3rds vote requirement for the budget’s passage. Speaker Nunez has declared that it will be a major priority for him. Doing that in conjunction with a re-examination of our tax system would make sense, however that tact did not work in 2004. Logically, it does make sense to address our revenue problems, as part of a larger budget discussion. Today Mark Leno has an op-ed in the Chronicle worth reading about reforming the budget process and historical look at the 2/3rds requirement.
The idea that a single legislator of the minority party can cause such suffering to millions of Californians is appalling. Maybe if the deadlock continues for another month or two, recognizing the risk that would present thousands of social-service providers, voters will more quickly understand that it is time to change the way we do business and enter the 21st century.
Obviously, the attempt in 2004 to address this very rule did not go well. The Republicans managed to scare the public about the potential for increased taxes. Nunez and Leno seem to be arguing for a ballot initiative to change it to a simple majority vote for the budget. That would fix the short term problems of the mechanisms for passing the budget, but looking at the tax vote requirement and Prop. 13 would address the supply problem. These are very thorny issues to say the least.
Right now there is not a clear or heck even a murky path to a resolution on the budget. Who knows when that will change or what will cause it to happen.
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I just got off a blogger conference call (primarily on budget issues) with Speaker Nunez. Julia Brian, Rick Jacobs, Robert Cruickshank, Brian Leubitz and I got to ask questions. Below the fold you’ll see some notes that I took on the conference call. My apologies is some of the stuff seems inconsistent.
Transcript of sorts below the fold.
Julia here I am going to go in an clean up a few pieces here, add some information in brackets where Dante missed a bit of the things the Speaker said. I am told there will be a video coming in YouTube format. We will get that up when it is available. Let me emphasize that these are notes, not a real transcript. Brian here: I added the video that the Speaker’s office uploaded. The playlist contains pretty much the entire call. I know I’d like to thank the Speaker for spending some time with us, and for fighting the good fight. Now, to get some of those transportation funds back…and the Vehicle License Fee.
SPEAKER NUNEZ: wants to let everyone know what’s going on with the budget impasse. Will take questions. The budget that was approved by the Assembly was described by George Skelton as a Republican budget. He [Nunez] doesn’t believe that. It’s not the budget he would have liked for California, but we don’t have the two-thirds power to pass a budget that he thinks would work, so he has to compromise. They compromised on the blind, disabled and the elderly, they agreed to deep cuts to public transportation. We cut over 900 million on local transportation agencies. We had to make deep cuts in that area. But I was able to protect higher education and public education, and many of the important social programs that people need to have dignity in their lives. We were able to concoct a responsible budget with $3.7 billion in the account, with a deficit of $700 million. And not having that would have required deeper cuts to education and social programs that were outside of my values.
Some people were critical of a tax package. I want to be very clear. I don’t support tax credits or corporate giveaways, but I support the Hollywood production tax credit because it generates more revenue for the states, but I don’t support the other types of tax credits. It was very clear to me and Sen. Villone that this will never go to the Senate because we did it at the 11th hour. It was a way for the Republicans to exercise some of their values.
Senator Ackerman began to denounce the Assembly and demand deeper cuts in the budget. Already, there were $7 million of line-item veto cuts in the budget. Any type of tax credit, as long as I’m speaker, we won’t do that. #2, I won’t entertain a discussion to dilute the AB32 bill to reduce greenhouse gas issues. The Republicans want us to dilute it. A 25% decrease by 2020. And that is real leadership to combat global warming. I won’t entertain a discussion to dilute it. #3, if Senator Ackerman wants me to re-engage the budget, I’ll want a restoration of public transportation, restoration of the SSI/SSP, and restoring the social programs in California. I also won’t entertain discussion of corporate tax credits or borrowing more money for water storage for as long as I’m speaker. We as Democrats need to draw the line in the sand on the ultra-conservatives like Mr. McClintock who are hijacking the budget. As a reasonable legislator, I won’t reward that type of behavior. I’m done negotiating this budget unless I get more of what I want in it. It had votes from Republicans in the Assembly. We’re at a budget impasse, and I’m hoping that the gang of 14 in the Senate finally allows their members to approve a budget to the people of this state.
RICK JACOBS: Thanks for doing the call. I have a question on public perception, with everyone in the state saying that the legislature is just a trainwreck and can’t agree on everything. I want to talk about how to help prevent that. Second, how do we start to frame everything that is happening by this small group of Republicans along two lines: First, they’re obstructionist, they don’t want the state to pay its bills, and that along with the fact that politically they’re trying to divide the state with this new electoral vote scheme, and when can we use this to say that prop 13 isn’t a good way to run a state:
SPEAKER NUNEZ: These are very good questions. On your first point, the conservative Republicans, not just here but nationwide, are trying to figure out how to make a comeback. They’re trying to follow the Gingrich model of shutting down government. They think that if you shut it down, the Republican ideology prevails. So if you’re not paying your bills to elderly care or child care, then they think they’re winning. SEIU members are working every day, so is the legislature. [This was in the context of Nunez discussing radio ads SEIU is conducting that calls on the legislature to come back to work. The Speaker notes that the Assembly did their work and they were not the hold up.] They’re very confusing messages. I did an interview today on Spanish TV, and they say, you’re the speaker, you solve the problem. But we have a 2/3rds vote requirement on the budget. When stuff like this happens, it makes people think that government doesn’t work, and that’s what Republicans love. They don’t want governments to work for other people. Now, about the initiative, it’s a total power grab and a very clever ploy. They want to take those districts, and that can help keep a Republican in the White House. They’re pretty well coordinated. This could put in danger not only California, but the future of the whole nation. Through manipulation, lies and deceit. We have to be careful. And about Prop 13, the way we tax in this state is very antiquated. It’s modeled based on the economy 50, 60, 70 years ago. We’re a sales-tax based economy. We need to rethink this strategy and look at the growing industries that are playing a critical role. People purchase things over the internet, and people don’t pay the state sales tax on that. Business properties, for instance-you’ll pay taxes based on the cost of a home, but on a business property, it doesn’t work that way. You’re not paying based on value, you’re paying it based on whatever it is based on whoever purchased it 20 years ago. It’s inconsistent. That discussion needs to happen, but the real discussion needs to be the 2/3rds vote requirement. If we can change that, we can be well on our way to being thoughtful about how to balance the budget.
JULIA ROSEN: A couple of questions. First, what initiative were you referring to?
SPEAKER NUNEZ: They’ll be out collecting signatures that will change the way we collect electoral votes. It will require the state to deliver electoral votes based on Congressional districts as opposed to winner-take-all. For it to work, it would need to happen in every state, but these people are looking to place a Republican in the white house. This is in the works. They haven’t started collecting signatures yet, but they’re trying to raise money for it and we’re going to try to defeat it.
JULIA ROSEN: What would it take to remove that 2/3rds requirement?
SPEAKER NUNEZ: A constitutional amendment that we’d have to put in front of the voters. We’re clearly in a bad situation. 38 days late, a lot of people aren’t getting paid. We need to use this scenario to demonstrate that the problem is the 2/3rds vote requirement. We’re one of only 3 states that does this, and the ultra-conservatives are holding up the budget and they’re demanding that I negotiate it, but the only thing that will come out of that is more cuts. And I’m not going to do that. The 2/3rds vote threshold is allowing the 10% minority to hold this up. And hopefully, we can be taken to a 55% or a simple majority budget, which we’ve tried before but didn’t win. This isn’t just the legislature holding it up. This is the ultra-conservative Republicans in the Senate.
ROBERT CRUICKSHANK: How does this affect the healthcare bill?
SPEAKER NUNEZ: My hope is that it won’t affect AB8. This is not a fully done proposal yet. This is 3.8 million people that will now have insurance if this bill passes. If we can get a couple of Republican votes, 2 in the Senate and 6 in the Assembly, then we can get this done. And if Congress expands SCHIP, then we can cover more children through federal dollars for people 300% above poverty level. It’s a simple majority bill, and Senator Perata said something about not taking up any legislation in the Senate. That was news to me. I don’t think we need to hold the Democratic agenda hostage to those who are holding the budget hostage. The good Democratic bills need to move through the legislature. My hope is that we can negotiate AB8, get back to the table and get it to the governor’s desk.
DANTE ATKINS: could you discuss the term limits initiative? A lot of people are saying that it’s just a way for people already in office to stay there.
SPEAKER NUNEZ: My consultant is one of the ones on that campaign. What it does is very simple. Under current term limit rules, any one person can run for office for 12 years. When I’m termed out of the Assembly, I can run for the Senate in 2010, and serve 8 years in the Senate. That would be 14 years. This initiative would reduce my lifetime service to 12 years, or to go to the Senate. The idea is to incentivize members to stay in the House that they were elected to so we don’t have this musical chairs problem. We’re supposed to be policy makers but we’re focused on being politicians and our careers. We need to be thinking long-term. Best example is what we’ve done with the prison system. Since the term limits law was enacted, we have been increasing sentences left and right and we have a system that is overpopulated, and the highest recidivism rate in the nation. They’re a bigger danger when they get out, and that’s because politicians want to say they’re tough on crime so that they can run for another office. And they want to say that they fought to increase the penalty for something. It’s not working for the people. I do benefit because I get six more years. I don’t intend to be there that long, but we need people with experience. It reduces the total number of years, but it allows people like me to stay in the Assembly.
BRIAN LEUBITZ: In the 2008 budget the high speed rail initiative has suffered dramatic cutbacks. Will you restore it next election?
SPEAKER NUNEZ: The Republicans are demanding zero deficit, which has required big cutbacks. There are some tough decisions we have to make. The filter I’m looking at all of this through is making sure that we improve quality of life for the people of California. You can come to three basic conclusions. The more you borrow, the more debt you incur for infrastructure, the deeper hole you’re in because you have to pay interest on it. So you need to take it from education, public safety or services. You’ll find a lot of Republican votes to cut education or services, but not public safety. I’d love to get high-speed rail, but I’m dealing with sacrificing programs for poor people to make these long-term investments. It’s a tough issue to grapple with, and I don’t know if we can do high-speed rail in the next election.
So, we’re driving through the streets of the Rohnert Park area, pretty place, that Rohnert Park, and we keep going. The GPS tells us to keep going and make a right, and then three more rights. And guess what? We’re back on the street that we were on before, now trying to make a left with no stop light. It turns out we really could have just made a left (with the light) a few blocks before where we originally turned right, but, um, I guess the GPS likes fun drives through subdivisions. I dunno, but I just hope nothing like that picture happens to the Assemblyman, you know