A modest proposal

It's good to see folks can learn from experience ... even if they are members of the Minnesota Legislature.

A couple of DFLers -- Rep. Lyndon Carlson and Sen. Richard Cohen are introducing a bill that will keep future governors -- Republican, Democrat or just plain crazy -- from repeating T-Paw's unallotment performance from last session.

According to a piece in this morning's Strib the proposal would "limit the governor's unallotment power in three ways:

"Governors could unallot only from the part of a projected budget deficit that was not known at the completion of the last legislative session.

"Payment to programs affected by unallotment would have to be reduced proportionately, and formulas or eligibility standards could not be changed.

"The governor could not unallot mor than 2 percent of the general fund budget and could not unallot more than 10 percent of a single general fund appropriation."

In other words, no future governor would be able to take a meat axe to a budget the legislature passed and he signed to satisfy the political whim of the moment while preserving executive flexibility to deal with unanticipated fluctuations in the state economy.

Of course, T-Paw -- continuing to play his favored role as Dr. No -- has promised to veto any bill limiting his authority.