OHH!

According to the Evergreen Freedom Foundation's list of Big Spenders, Senator Claudia Kauffman is now one of the most expensive legislators in Olympia, with over $2 billion in new taxes and fees proposed this year.
She now joins the company of the fiscally reckless Maralyn Chase, Adam Kline, and Jeanne Kohl-Wells.
The list is compiled by EFF from the fiscal notes produced by the state Office of Financial Management as a result of Initiative 960 which requires the state to keep track of the ten-year cost of all proposed legislation.

Attorney General Rob McKenna's office quietly released an informal Attorney General's opinion today that knocked the wind out of Senate Bill 5446, the employer gag law.
The law "Prohibiting certain employer communications about political or religious matters" has caused a stir in Olympia because it is clearly aimed at hobbling employers and threatens to seriously worsen Washington's already dismal business climate.
The list of those testifying for and against the bill is a Who's Who of business and labor:

Persons Testifying: PRO: Rick Bender, WSLC; Diana Zahn, UFCW 21; Tom Wroblewski, IAM
CON: AWB; Boeing Company; Washington Roundtable; NFIB; Association Builders & Contractors.

The informal AGO states federal law preempts the state from interfering in labor relations.
Perhaps Senators Prentice, Kohl-Welles, Keiser, McDermott, Fairley, Franklin, Kline,
Murray, Ranker, Tom, Shin, Regala, Hobbs, Kauffman, Pridemore, McAuliffe, Kastama,
Hatfield, Oemig, Fraser and Jacobsen will need to find a different way to ingratiate themselves with state labor leaders.

The state budget deficit is now more than eight billion dollars, according to Arun Raha, the state's chief revenue forecaster, in a preview of the official March forecast.
Here's what the Seattle Times article said:

Washington state forecasters had previously projected a nearly $6 billion shortfall. Thursday's preliminary forecast shows an additional $721 million gap in the current two-year budget and $1.6 billion more in the next biennium that starts in July. That pushed the overall shortfall to $8 billion.

Still, we shouldn't forget, it is an increase in spending. It's more revenue than the last two-year budget, but much less than the Democrats had hoped to spend.
Eric Earling, at Sound Politics remembers that something about that $8 billion rings a bell ... it's the amount spending increased during Gregoire's first term.
It would be nice if someone had a list of the moron legislators who voted for those spending increases. Here's just such a list: the Senate, and House votes when the last two-year budget was approved.