I'm starting to really wonder if the D's were really intending on doing anything with that 2/3 majority. It's been pretty quiet since November. Although, I must say I was reading back around the holidays that there were several expected vacancies coming up too, so I won't get too tinfoily.
http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_22111497/california-democrats-supermajority-powers-will-be-short-lived
"California Democrats' supermajority powers will be short-lived
SACRAMENTO -- When Democrats last month achieved broad taxing powers by capturing supermajorities in both chambers of the Legislature, Democratic leaders immediately ruled out new taxes, saying they didn't want to be seen as overreaching just after voters approved Gov. Jerry Brown's $6 billion annual tax hike.
<snip>
That's because the Democrats' supermajority status will be short-lived, wiped out for most of 2013 because a spate of expected vacancies and special elections will whittle their ranks to below the two-thirds threshold in the Assembly.
"There will be a very short window that Democrats will have the supermajority," said Eric Bauman, vice chairman of the state Democratic Party. "So I've been cautioning party activists to be patient."
Assembly Democrats will lose their two-thirds majority in late April if, as expected, Assembly members Ben Hueso, D-Chula Vista, and Norma Torres, D-Pomona, win special elections for seats that open when two state senators leave for Congress. And the Assembly will likely lose two other members when one runs for the Los Angeles City Council and another leaps to the Senate after another senator also runs for the council. If that all happens, Assembly Democrats won't be able to recapture their supermajority until January 2014.
I don't know how this new defection makes that more tricky now.
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