Monday’s Briefing: Devil’s In The Details

State lawmakers come back to Albany at the end of the week to take up the Governor’s call for big budget cuts.

• But will they do it?  History suggests they won’t. And this analysis suggests many lawmakers have their fingers in their ears when the Gov. talks about a budget crisis.
• The NY Times explores what went into Paterson’s decisions.
• The Times also gets “experts” to argue whether it’s really a “crisis” or not, as if that mattered to the overtaxed and underemployed.
• Gov. Paterson’s not ruling out taxes to help fill the gap, but one thing he’ll fight is a pay raise for legislators.

Gonna be interesting, that’s for sure.

Elsewhere:

• One state union’s boiling mad that you can look up every state worker’s salary.  The union may sue.
• The NY Post says a still-secret state audit shows tens of thousands of people leave the state but stay on, and keep getting checks from, the taxpayer-funded Medicaid rolls.
• New taxpayer group will sue to stop economic development loans and benefits.
• If a State Senator from Illinois can run for President, can these New York State Senators run for something, too?
• If NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg runs for Governor in 2010, NY Post’s Fred Dicker says the current Governor will bow out.
• Rochester D&C says Republicans like their chances in Renzi v. Aubertine, and a couple of other races.
• Some of the new benefits for gay couples legally married elsewhere include shooting bear on your spouse’s land.
• Racinos’ machines go ka-ching!
• Mothers fight for the legal right to breastfeed babies.

And:

• One guy gets the courthouse confessional.

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