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December 31, 2009

RONNIE ELLIS: Good riddance to 2009 - and a look ahead

By RONNIE ELLIS The Glasgow Daily Times Thu Dec 31, 2009, 09:57 AM CST

FRANKFORT — Aren’t you glad 2009 is gone? Happy New Year!

Ice storms, swine flu, floods, and budget cuts. A gruesome murder, a massive recession, and spending gone wild at quasi-government organizations. House Speaker Greg Stumbo buying votes for gambling with promises of new schools while Gov. Steve Beshear bought off Republican Senators with lucrative state jobs. The only thing missing was the locusts. No wonder the public mood is angry. So what will 2010 look like a year from now?

Start with the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate. Trey Grayson was seen as the presumptive nominee but Rand Paul upset his apple cart and now appears to be the front-runner. He’s riding a wave of resentment and anger over Washington policies and those bailouts. But Kentucky Republicans may not want to look too deeply behind some of his positions on voting against any unbalanced budget and against all earmarks, some inserted by Kentucky Republicans Mitch McConnell and Hal Rogers. But Grayson’s campaign is floundering and he may find it difficult to regain momentum. The petty sniping and hourly press releases by Democrats Jack Conway and Daniel Mongiardo seem almost irrelevant. It looks like a Republican year and it’s unlikely the economy will improve soon enough to help Democrats in 2010.

History says the General Assembly will avoid making tough choices during an election year on serious fiscal problems facing the state. Senate Republicans are in no mood to cooperate after they were pressured to raise tobacco and alcohol taxes last spring and then saw that issue used against Jimmy Higdon in a special election. (Some of the pressure came from their own Senate leadership.) Despite claims by Beshear and the horse industry, I don’t see the votes to pass gambling in the Senate, and that includes at least a couple of Democrats. Over in the House, Stumbo says he’s not anxious to take up gambling without some indication it has a reasonable chance in the Senate.

Beshear says it’s no time for “broad based tax increases,” meaning he won’t support proposals by Republican Bill Farmer or Democrat Jim Wayne. But Stumbo signaled he’d be willing to look at tax reform and Senate President David Williams has said he’d support reform. Stumbo could be distinguishing himself from Beshear or he might be shoring up support among supporters of Wayne’s proposal whose votes Stumbo may need on other issues. Williams’ idea of tax reform is likely far different than Wayne’s and perhaps even Farmer’s. Meanwhile the state faces a shortfall of between $900 million and $1.4 billion (depending on which set of numbers you accept).

Gubernatorial speculation is never far from the surface in Kentucky. Will Stumbo listen to those whispering in his ear to challenge an incumbent Democrat? Will Republicans concede their nomination to Richie Farmer? Are there other Democrats thinking of challenging Beshear? If Beshear can’t pass gambling and if the budget picture doesn’t improve, will he relish the thought of another care taker term without any money to spend?

Can the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate defeat whichever Republican gets his party’s nomination in a red state in a probable Republican year? And if Paul pulls it off, will he support McConnell as Republican Leader in the Senate? Could a Paul victory result in McConnell’s fall and the diminishment of Kentucky’s influence in Congress?

I don’t know the answer to any of those questions. I just hope 2010 is better than 2009.

RONNIE ELLIS writes for CNHI News Service and is based in Frankfort. Reach him at rellis@cnhi.com. Follow CNHI News Service stories on Twitter at www.twitter.com/cnhifrankfort.

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