• Let’s call it the “missing umbrella in the rain” syndrome. The best ideas fall by the wayside in hard times.
• Source: GOVERNING   |   Nation   |   August 10, 2012
• Katherine Barrett and Richard Greene, in August's Smart Management column on how gainsharing -- the concept of sharing unspent dollars with other employees and agencies -- is often ignored when budgets are the smallest.

• The NFL and NCAA have a contract with ESPN to televise point spreads on major games, and you're telling me there's no betting on sports already going on?
• Source: McClatchy Newspapers   |   New Jersey   |   August 9, 2012
• New Jersey state Sen. James Whelan, responding to the NCAA and four professional sports leagues' decision to file a lawsuit against the state to stop it from implementing sports betting at casinos and race tracks.

• No one’s saying ‘I’m not sure about this Obama guy but, boy, I love Biden.'
• Source: PolitickerNJ   |   New Jersey   |   August 8, 2012
• New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who said Mitt Romney's pick for vice president will have little impact on the presidential campaign.
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• This is essentially the same bill that got the international ridicule, it’s just time-limited to four years.
• Source: The Associated Press   |   North Carolina   |   August 7, 2012
• Molly Diggins, director of the Sierra Club in North Carolina, where Gov. Bev Perdue allowed a bill to become law that bans the state from using a science panel’s recommendation to plan for rising sea levels until more studies are conducted in 2016.
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• Those who we're asking to pay more, I think they can. And I think it says in the New Testament, 'For those whom much is given, much will be asked,' and that's what we're doing today.
• Source: The Sacramento Bee   |   Oakland, Calif.   |   August 6, 2012
• California Gov. Jerry Brown's biblical justification for his November ballot measure asking voters to raise taxes.
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• Only the U.S. tax code can turn the 'thrill of victory' into the agony of victory.
• Source: Los Angeles Times   |   Nation   |   August 3, 2012
• Reps. Mary Bono Mack (R-Palm Springs) and G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), sponsors of a bill to eliminate the taxes Olympic athletes must pay on the earnings they receive for winning medals. Olympians who win medals receive $25,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver and $10,000 for bronze from the U.S. Olympic Committee.

• The traditional notions about retirement ... and moving somewhere warm, doesn't really reflect accurately the notions of retirement in America.
• Source: USA Today   |   Nation   |   August 2, 2012
• Paul Irving, chief operating officer at the Milken Institute, which published a report naming the best U.S. cities for aging. Provo, Utah, and Sioux Falls, S.D., were respectively named the best large and small cities for seniors.

• Please feel free to include both of us in social gatherings as we will not find it awkward.
• Source: Denver Post   |   Colorado   |   August 1, 2012
• Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper's official statement announcing his divorce from his wife, Helen Thorpe. The couple said "neither has had an affair, that they did seek extended counseling, and that this decision is unrelated to the difficult events Colorado has faced this summer."

• There’s a lot of important outreach that needs to happen before January 1, 2014, and it’s going to be extremely difficult to do that when you have state leaders standing there saying, ‘Over our dead bodies.’ 
• Source: Washington Post   |   Oklahoma   |   July 31, 2012
• David Blatt, director of a state policy think tank in Oklahoma, where both political leaders and residents are skeptical of the federal government and the health-care reform law's insurance mandate. Jan. 1, 2014, marks the day when most Americans will be required to have health coverage.

• Public officials have a right to expect that their minor children are off limits from political opponents.
• Source: Politico   |   South Carolina   |   July 30, 2012
• South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who is outraged over a local newspaper's story about her 14-year-old daughter's employment at the Statehouse gift shop. The reporter questioned whether this qualifies as nepotism.
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• If they want to cause disruption or whatever, that’s their choice.
• Source: AP   |   Indiana   |   July 27, 2012
• Indiana House Minority Leader Pat Bauer, who House Democrats replaced yesterday out of frustration with his handling of campaign fundraising and spending heading into November.

• Legalization isn’t in the president’s vocabulary.
• Source: GOVERNING   |   Nation   |   July 26, 2012
• Gil Kerlikowske, drug czar for the Obama administration, which has said that it opposes any efforts to legalize marijuana. In November, Colorado, Oregon and Washington state voters will decide whether to legalize the drug for commercial use.

• Research has revealed that human memory is not like a video recording that a witness need only replay to remember what happened. Eyewitness identification must be scrutinized carefully.
• Source: New Jersey Star-Ledger   |   New Jersey   |   July 25, 2012
• What judges will be required to tell jurors in New Jersey, starting after Labor Day, in an effort to increase the reliability of eyewitness testimony and discourage innocent people from being convicted of crimes.

• This is the worst violation of the public trust that one could imagine.
• Source: GOVERNING   |   California   |   July 24, 2012
• Ted Jackson, former deputy director of operations at the California parks department, which had been underreporting its funds and accumulated nearly $54 million in "hidden assets" over 12 years. The state is investigating why and how this occurred and several of the department's leaders have either resigned or been fired.

• They are now the masters of their own fate. If they comply, they will get the money. If they don't, they won't.
• Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution   |   Georgia   |   July 23, 2012
• Larry Winter, a member of Georgia's Board of Education, which took the unprecedented step of stripping Dougherty County School District of federal funding over concerns that it exaggerated the number of students who qualify for federal meal assistance.