This late in the session, time compresses. A meticulous and formal process that ensures bills get hearings, public airings, readings and time for debate, gets compressed into a Dali-like distortion of days or weeks. Weeks become days or hours or minutes. Clocks bend and the sound of voices requesting unanimous consent to dispense with the rules speed and rise in pitch until our words become like the drone of mosquitoes singing in a hollow granite drum.
So when the Governor's veto stamp falls, some things run backward while others speed and in a flash what was undone is redone. The veto, so dreaded, is just red ink on now meaningless paper.
This morning in the Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee we re-did 8 vetoed bills in a few minutes. No debate. On the Senate floor, while we amended horrific education cutting bills from Goedde, Nonini & Luna, the House killed Otter's $70 million road tax and fee increase which Senate Republicans passed yesterday.
Like space squashed, stone and bodies and wooden desks warp like silly putty, we trade place on sides of votes, rearranging chairs while the mosquito voices hum. Republican leaders return from the Governor's office. Deals have been cut on more sides than any players may realize. There are millions of dollars at stake and they, like a magnet or worm hole, bend flesh, squish us all in fast forward through these last few days.