On the Maryland political news site Center Maryland, contributing writer John Kurtz forecasts a session loaded with deeply held and emotional issues, somewhat in contrast to some expectations following the hard-fought compromises and struggles of the 2012 legislative efforts. From his writing:
By all means, let’s have those debates on the death penalty and gun control. They’re worth having, and most of O’Malley’s proposals are sound.
But let’s also recognize that by doing so we’ve concocted a toxic brew of emotional issues that are bound to dominate the discourse for the entire General Assembly session. Many other worthy issues are liable to be ignored, if not cast aside altogether.
Kurtz then reflects that transportation funding may be among the issues that fail to surface amidst the other contentious debates:
Take the far more prosaic — and now perennial — discussion in Maryland over transportation and infrastructure funding. Here is a glaring need, a structural deficit of dangerous proportions, that no one seems ready or willing to address.
