"What, me worry?" -- "If they want me to be more involved, I will be," says Gov. Perdue after vetoing the midyear budget.

As I noted in an April 11 post, the $142 million property tax rebate for Georgia homeowners was technically an appropriation, and as such, the governor had the power of the line-item veto.

That post goes on to say that if this rebate is included in the midyear budget -- which of course it was -- I hoped the governor would veto it.

It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the governor had done this rather than vetoing the whole budget bill. The midyear budget would not have been perfect by a long shot, but what should the governor have expected when he had had so little input and involvement during the current legislative session, unlike past sessions.

After his State of the State address, we rarely heard from him until the very end when the tax rebate idea was floated. And even then, had he let Speaker Richardson know that he definitely would veto the midyear budget if the rebate were included -- rather than just strongly hinting it -- things might have turned out differently.

Regardless, back to the issue of what might have happened if the governor had just line-item vetoed the $142 million rebate rather than the whole budget bill. In such a case, I think the governor would have delivered the budget to the House prior to adjournment, and even if the House had voted to override the veto, I think it is possible that the lieutenant governor would have allowed a vote on whether to sustain the veto, and in such case, the veto may well have stuck.