“The governor-elect has already said he preferred not to cut state employees because we’re trying to keep a job work force, and we’re gonna have to look at different areas of the budget. Between TennCare and additional initiatives in education we’re gonna have to just look to see where some of this monies will come from.” Sargent says any cuts to the state budget will have to be carefully crafted. He’s not a fan of across-the-board reductions. “I don’t believe in just saying we’re gonna cut everything three percent, or four percent, or whatever the percentage is. I believe that we have to look at each department and not just do a flat cut.”

Knoxville Mayor Bill Haslam unveiled his new budget this afternoon and, as expected, does look like the current budget. The $165.3 million budget does not contain any new taxes. A $3 million revenue shortfall has been shored up by cutting expenses by $3 million. He also said the city will not have to dip into its fund balance for operating expenses.

"This is more honest than any budget in many, many years," Mr. Cooper said. "That also means it's also ugly. I welcome the honesty. I think it's time for Americans to grapple with fundamental problems and not pretend that wars are free and things like that."

He later told reporters that lawmakers and state officials shouldn’t think the state’s budget woes are going away because of the stimulus. “It would be really crazy of us to take this money and then forget about any other savings because we could find ourselves in two years with the same problem all over again and the federal government isn’t there to help us,” he warned.

Lets just say that works itself out. Budget is balanced or pretty close to it. Maybe Even a little surplus. In steps Obama and the deficit spending Washington Democrats. They pass his huge spending program/state bailout. The state suddenly get a windfall of (some estimate) $400 million. That puts the state at least $400 mill in the plus late in the year. Possibly even as session gets close to end. Phil will want to re expand programs or go on a spending spree but the votes may be a little tougher to get this time. By already having a budget, with no educatin cuts, it is proven it can be done and the government does not truly need to be as big as it is. Many Republicans have supported the idea of when their is a sudden surplus when the legislature is out of session that instead of giving it to the governor to do campaign road projects with that it should go into a fund to be voted on by the legislature or to remove taxes. We could go on a spending spree as we have in years past or we could make a strong statement that a new day has truly come to Nashville. What kind of statement could we make with $400 million that would help every single Tennessean?

"We actually could end up with a decent year," the governor told reporters in a surprisingly upbeat report on the latest budget maneuverings. "There will be budget cuts everywhere, but it could be 6 or 7 or 8 percent, and there you're not talking about layoffs anymore. You're not talking about closing down major programs or something like that."

Perhaps this is a problem inherent within a democratic republic. Politicians are making decisions based on the 'feelings' of their constituents rather than hard-headed statistical data. As an example, China wouldn't dare think about mothballing a multi-billion dollar project like Yucca Mountain because a few local residents had irrational fears...yet in our system of government if enough people have irrational fears, they are then justified by political leaders who put re-election above the good of our nation as a whole.

The provision would have eliminated a tax break for commercial real estate holdings of Family Owned Non-Corporate Entities, or FONCEs. A limited liability company is a non-corporate entity. Business lobbyists and some like-minded lawmakers have targeted that section of the Bredesen administration’s so-called “technical corrections bill,” saying it would be a tax increase on some small businesses. The administration says it would only hurt wealthy families. But apparently the business lobby won the fight as the provision was taken out of the technical corrections bill today.

"Upper management making out like bandits and getting lavish party facilities while the rank-and-file stand to lose everything.Gov. Bredesen promised voters he'd run Tennessee like a business. We didn't know he meant Enron," said Hobbs.

Gov. Phil Bredesen is proposing elimination of 2,011 state government jobs, roughly 5 percent of the executive branch work force. He's hopeful that most of the reductions can occur through voluntary buyouts. The governor said in a press conference this morning the layoffs will provide about $64 million of the $468 million in cuts needed to trim his original budget plan, outlined earlier this year. The $468 million figure is the low end of the shortfall projected by the State Funding Board, whose economists said it could grow to as much as $580 million. Bredesen said his planned cuts would need to be revisited if the most optimistic deficit projection falls through. He said he has asked higher education to make $55 million in cuts but will let the University of Tennessee and Board of Regents systems decide specifics.