REPUBLICANS, TEA PARTY AND RINOS

posted by Michael Chihak

Read a good rundown from the Arizona Capitol Times' Caitlin Coakley here on the potential appearance of cracks in what has been a pretty solid wall of Republican majority rule in Arizona state government.

The vitriol between Democrats and Republicans in the Arizona Senate last week at the opening of the special session on extending unemployment benefits was but a sideshow to that perhaps bigger issue: that GOP legislators aren't all in lock step.

It showed when GOP Gov. Jan Brewer called the special session despite several of her party's legislative leaders saying they opposed the benefits extension.

It came clear into the open when both houses of the Legislature recessed quickly Friday without taking any action on the governor's proposal. That's despite Brewer's claim that she went into it thinking she had the votes needed for passage and that she specifically had a deal with Senate President Russell Pearce.

What happens today -- and perhaps continuing this week -- when the Legislature reconvenes will be of high interest in relation to governance of the state.