"The Governor lied to me."

So says Arizona state-house speaker Jim Weiers in response to the Governor's vetoes of select bills negotiated as part of this month's budget deal. Friday, the Governor was to sign the budget bills but she chose to veto 4 of them including the education tax-credit bill on which hinged the entire deal for state Republicans:

An angry Jim Weiers, the House speaker who worked with Napolitano to break the budget impasse, wrote, "There is only one way to put this: 'The governor lied to me.' "

He and other Republican legislative leaders believed that in exchange for allowing the governor to expand her all-day kindergarten program she would give the go-ahead for the tax credit that would allow companies to get tax relief for donating money for scholarships in private schools.

The Governor's version of events is that other components of the agreement fell through when Republican legislator's pushed through education bills that differed from what she asked for: Napolitano pinned the blame for the veto on Republicans, saying they broke the deal when they ignored Democrats during negotiations on a bill designed to help students who struggle to learn English. She vetoed that bill as well."Part of our agreement was that they would reach a bipartisan agreement on English-language instruction," Napolitano said. "They did not."She also wanted the tuition tax-credit plan to end after five years; the Republicans ended up pushing through legislation that called only for a review at the end of the five years.

Both parties knew this budget represented a compromise, and to see the Governor take what she got and slam the door on what she gave is beyond dissapointing. When you compromise, you get part of what you want and you give part of what you don't want. Frankly, Janet looks like an Indian-giver.

Her number-1 stated priority in the budget was the all-day kindergarten funding, and she got it. All of it. In return, she agreed to a modified-version of what Republicans had asked for in the education bills. And both parties agreed to it, happily:

Just two weeks ago, both sides were smiling after shaking hands on a "bipartisan budget." Napolitano had agreed to the school-choice measure in exchange for $17 million to expand all-day kindergarten, $7 million for first-year funding for a downtown Phoenix medical school and a host of other spending increases for children and families. The creation of corporate-tax credits for businesses that donate to private-school scholarship funds would have been capped at $5 million for the next five years.

Her explanations aside, to conservatives the perception is and will be that she went back on her deal: Sidney Hay of the Alliance for School Choice said Napolitano's credibility is on the line."Are we confident? Can we trust her after she went back on her word?" Hay asked. "It's sad when you can't trust the leader of your state to keep her word."

I wrote just Thursday about how I, despite my strong conservative stances on issues, had not been given any good reason to blind-vote Republican in the '06 Governor's race. Perhaps I just spoke too soon.