Utah legislators got a lesson in humility today, and we can only hope they learned something from it.
When they ramrodded the the bill gutting Utah’s open government (GRAMA) laws through the process in less than 3 days, they even admitted doing it on a non-election year to stifle voter backlash. I don’t care what the party is, being a one-party system like Utah has developed into just begs for governmental abuse, and on this our leaders didn’t let us down. Over the last few years they have passed laws making it harder and harder to get citizen initiatives on the ballot. They have refused ethics legislation, despite the public outcry for it. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
What they (hopefully) learned is that they, in fact, do not have absolute power. The public uproar, justifiably fueled by the media, was intense and had no look of dwindling soon. Despite all odds, turned in favor of the legislature by the legislature, a citizen initiative to repeal HB477 had cropped up already and was flourishing. After the 2007 citizen referendum that eventually repealed the legislature’s school voucher puppy, I don’t think they were ready to let us slap them in the face again. So they repealed HB477 in a special session called for by the Governor. Yea for them. Now, let’s just see if they can retain this sense of humility for more than 3 days.
2 comments:
I don't think they're humble; I think they're scared that if they didn't repeal this, the media wouldn't let it die for 2 years -- until the next election.
It's incredible how many of these spineless whimps started singing a different tune as soon as they realized they wouldn't get away with it.
I say, let's fire ALL of them and start over.
Yeah, and I hope they don't forget it too soon. Hopefully the media won't let the general public forget too soon and we'll see a big change next election. Although I'm not going to hold my breath.
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