Fuck Kumbaya!

Okay, that title ought to get me blocked on a lot of servers ... but that's basically what a couple of south Florida Democrats are saying today about getting along with their fellow state senators. Well, at least that's my uncivil interpretation ...

State Sen. Jeremy Ring, D-Parkland, said it's nice that senators of both parties work together on most issues, unlike the more partisan House, where the Republican majority often ignores the minority party.

But, Ring said, the looming budget cuts coming in a special legislative session next month, are too important to avoid the toughest choices.

For Democrats "last year was a nice year. It was kind of Kumbaya. We worked kind of well together," Ring said. "No more. We've got to stand up now. We've got to stop being this Kumbaya."

The current approach favored by Senate leaders involves across the board cuts to the state budget to close the gap created by a shortfall in expected tax revenue to the state.

"What we're afraid of is they're going to cut some real money out of education and cut real money out of health care [and] cut real money out of social services," Ring said at Tuesday night's meeting of the Broward Democratic Party.

Sen. Ring and fellow Sen. Ted Deutch (D-Boca Raton) are taking it to the GOP in exactly the way I would, by holding their feet to the fire on the tax issues. The Republicans in Tallahassee are strangling the state, putting a few bucks back in the citizens' pockets while decimating municipalities and the services they provide (not to mention schools, community colleges, and universities).

Democrats need to be different, [Ring] said.

"No more of this Kumbaya up in the state Legislature. We have got to realize it is our job. We are the last defense to protect our children, our senior citizens, and our disabled."

Deutch said the budget needs to be balanced. But he said it makes no sense to simply cut $400 million from education and more than $400 million from health care without legislatures "engag(ing) in the difficult task to find out if there are any other options for increasing our revenue."

Yeah, I know it's just a couple of voices in the woods, but you have to start somewhere. Good on ya, Jeremy and Ted. Keep the pressure on.

(h/t to Wayne Garcia)