Did we elect a common sense Governor? I think not.

Sometimes I wonder just how thoughtful and how much common sense our elected officials have when it comes to laws. This year, there were three bills that I followed very closely. Two out of the three bills have passed and are becoming law. The third bill was causally forgotten about and left for dead by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Two of these three bills had common sense and the third had none at all.

The first bill that passed had no common sense. People that are not here legally are now able to apply for instate tuition and receive it. Why does this bill have no common sense? Reduced tuition should only be available to state residents, those who pay taxes into the state's system. If you are illegal, you can never hold legal employment in this state and thus unable to pay taxes into our system.

The second bill that passed had some common sense to it, but not much. Maryland house bill 1282 ( http://mlis.state.md.us/2011rs/billfile/HB1282.htm ) requires that any parking garage that receives state funding be required to allow motorcycles to park in them. Unfortunately this bill has a side of it that makes no common sense at all. Why did it not include all parking garages? Motorcycles that are properly licensed and insured will still see rejections when trying to enter some parking garages.

Finally Maryland Senate Bill 213 ( http://mlis.state.md.us/2011rs/billfile/sb0213.htm ) was causally and quietly forgotten about. This common sense bill would help protect our parks in Anne Arundel County by making our parks have the same '' laws that our schools do. Apparently the Senate Judiciary Committee doesn't believe that the rest of our elected officials should even be able to vote on this law. What really ticks me off is that the Senate Judiciary Committee could care less about the drug deals, the needles, and the drug use happening in these same parks where our kids visit after school.

Common sense does not seem to be prevalent by most of our elected officials here in Maryland. Before you know it, our Governor will approve millions in new spending and then have to tax us more to support his spending habit. Those new taxes will probably happen in a special session where the media will not even be allowed to cover it in person. My prediction:  We will, before this year is out, will have a higher gas tax and possibility even a 7% state sales tax to go right along with the Anne Arundel County tax increase.

Everyday, I lose faith in the majority of our elected officials. Maybe someday, we will elect more of those who can really make a difference and can create change. The change I'm talking about is common sense.