Jon Ralston explains why Session Lite will pack a hangover

Wednesday, June 6, 2007 | 7:11 a.m.

With the soon-forgotten embarrassment of Tuesday's special session, the 2007 Legislature will fade into history with a simple label: Session Lite - everything you wanted in a Legislature ... and less.

This comes courtesy of a tastes great, less filling governor whose no-new-taxes brew goes down smoothly but really does nothing for you, and a Legislature that took only sips from the smooth but tasteless gubernatorial offering and refused to send anything back until Jim Gibbons served it something more palatable.

The story line of this session is pretty simple: Not much grand policy was adopted. Governor keeps campaign pledge. Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley gets what she could. Republicans in Senate stand by governor. Gibbons and lawmakers get enough of a transportation-funding bill to crow to constituents (who will not see much benefit by the time they vote next year). Big decisions on big issues left to next Legislature to punt.

And so it goes. Pretty soon now, these capital alchemists will try to take pedestrian beer and turn it into fine wine and hope the public can't taste the difference.

Sometime soon, if he hasn't already, Gibbons will call a news conference and declare victory - just as all governors do after lawmakers generally cave to their budget demands. Legislatures rarely change executive budgets but by a few percentage points. So Gibbons got his budget, give or take a fraction, he got his empowerment schools funding and he kept his read-my-lips promise. How is that not game, set and match?

Time for a beer, governor. But make it a Lite.

Lawmakers can mewl all they want about how they were hamstrung because of the governor's taxing demand. But this Pilate-like behavior is a little disingenuous.

They met in special session Tuesday over nothing. And they could have made it about something.

They could have sent Gibbons a budget with some real growth in education funding and let him veto it - and then overridden him. They could have sent the governor a real transportation infrastructure funding package and let him veto it - and then overridden him. But they did not - and that is their responsibility.

I don't blame Buckley, who had no choice to take what she could get when she realized the state Senate would not count to 14 and that the upper house Republicans probably would stand with the governor. Yes, she could have had her caucus vote for a tax increase to pay for education and/or transportation, but such a statement would have been futile and perhaps politically disastrous without some GOP votes.

So she got something, but Buckley surely is shaking her head privately about how little it is while boasting publicly about Democratic accomplishments. And Republicans in both houses surely are quite pleased with themselves for standing up for the governor and holding the line on taxes.

Time for beer, lawmakers of both parties. But make it a Lite.

And just where were the special interests, especially business and gaming, which pay lip service to finding a stable way to fund growth? Why weren't they turning the screws to senators to get a real growth package passed for transportation - and how about education, too?

They were worried more about their own bottom lines, but that, too, is shortsighted. Taxing initiatives will be here for them, sooner or later.

Time for a beer, chamber and gaming folks. But make it a Lite.

There will not be much time for everyone to celebrate, though. In 2009 the failure to dramatically address the state's growing problems may finally cause serious consequences. Combine that with this year's sop to a public benefits shortfall that could emasculate the general fund and a spending cap that will severely constrict spending in two years and Session Lite could cause quite the delayed hangover.

Some might say I am a Cassandra, but something has to give. Perhaps the inexorable approach of term limits, which will take effect after next session, will cause some in Carson City to sober up and discover they are vertebrates after all.

For now, though, everyone should drink up and enjoy the buzz. But make it a Lite.