I have known Jonathan since middle school and have been friends with him for years.

As a third generation Tucsonan and former businesswoman, I work hard to represent the independent minded men and women of Southern Arizona. I look forward to discussing our nation's most important issues with whomever the Republican nominee is.

I remain focused on the job that my constituents hired me to do. My priorities are Arizona’s priorities - securing our border, rebuilding the economy , supporting our military and veterans and ensuring access to affordable health care.

Illustrations by Rand Carlson.

If state Sen. Jonathan Paton does announce tomorrow that he will get into the race for the Congressional District 8 seat now held by Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, we can expect Rep. Frank Antenori to look for a promotion to Paton's Senate seat.

Antenori believes Paton will run for Congress; he sent out the following bulletin today:

Current State Representative Frank Antenori will launch his campaign for Legislative District 30 Senate as soon as current District 30 Senator Jonathan Paton makes his widely anticipated announcement for Congress this Sunday.

Several residents of the district have asked Rep. Antenori if who will fill the seat and he assured them that he will be running for District 30 Senate. Rep. Antenori stated: “My constituents have expressed concern that a conservative continue to hold the Senate seat. I assured them that I will keep working to bring more businesses and jobs to Arizona and District 30 so we can wave good bye to the recession and the deficits. It is imperative that we get this state back on the right economic and budgetary track. That is my mission.”

One question that remains: Will Paton stick out his term or resign to focus on the race? We expect it would be the latter, if for no other reason than to avoid having to vote for the brutal cuts that will be necessary to balance the budget. If that's the case, Antenori could also try to wrangle an appointment to Paton's seat.

State Sen. Rebecca Rios has released a statement on Gov. Jan Brewer's proposed budget:

The governor’s budget continues to take Arizona down the wrong path. We hope that in the coming days Arizonans will see that this budget is completely unworkable and only cause more damage to our already ailing economy.

A primary concern with the governor’s budget it that it disproportionately cuts services to children, the mentally ill and working families. Cutting 310,000 people from AHCCCS, 47,000 from KidsCare and 17,000 from mental health services is a cost shift to the already broken health care system which will in turn almost necessarily raise rates for services.

We have said time and again that we are willing to come to the table to help negotiate a budget with the governor and share with her some of our ideas. Unfortunately, the governor was not there with us long today for us to ask questions of her or share those ideas.

State Sen. Jonathan Paton, who had said that we would know whether he was running for the congressional seat held by Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords by Saturday, now says that he'll have something to tell us on Sunday.

Republican gubernatorial candidate John Munger answers Gov. Jan Brewer call for her rivals to present a plan.

Governor Brewer:

Last week, you issued a request to receive in the next five days “substantive, realistic proposals from…potential gubernatorial candidates on how they plan to fix the state’s fiscal crisis.”

I have developed a plan which actually solves Arizona’s fiscal crisis and balances the budget without a tax increase and I would like to review it with you in a face-to-face meeting at your offices on Tuesday, January 19th, 2010.

To ensure transparency to the people of Arizona, I invite the media to attend our meeting. This issue is of such magnitude that I believe that only you and I need to speak directly, without the intercession of staff or campaign advisors.

Concurrent with our meeting, I will be distributing my plan to members of the State legislature and posting it on www.johnmunger.com

As I have promptly responded to your request, I would appreciate an immediate response from you. Please contact me as soon as possible to schedule this meeting.

I look forward to helping you fulfill Arizona’s responsibility to our taxpayers.

Sincerely,

John Munger

State Rep. David Lujan has released a statement on the budget:

Today the governor released a budget plan that continues to push Arizona down the wrong track and makes even more devastating cuts to education, jobs and health care.

To get Arizona on the right track, Democrats support making cuts to wasteful, non-essential services, closing tax loopholes, using federal stimulus dollars and implementing tough immigration reform. While she did adopt some of our ideas, like restoring some Department of Revenue funding to go after tax cheats, Gov. Brewer continues to fail to listen to the voters of Arizona by asking them to vote on Propositions 105 and 204, which they already approved.

House Democrats are disappointed that the governor’s state of the state speech was so partisan, but as always, we continue to be committed to work toward a bipartisan, comprehensive solution for a stronger Arizona.

We forecast in this week’s Skinny that Gov. Jan Brewer’s proposed budget cuts would be brutal.

We were right.

• RAND CARLSON
• Gov. Jan Brewer's budget proposal: Goodbye to all that

The grim news: Even with a one-cent sales-tax increase, state government is going to decimated.

We’ll have more analysis and reaction soon, but here are some highlights:

In FY 10—the current fiscal year that ends in June—Brewer wants to cut $92 million. In FY 2011, which starts in July, Brewer wants to cut $1.159 billion.

All-day kindergarten is gone.

Programs for gifted students are gone.

AIMS intervention programs are gone.

Early education block grants are gone.

Vocational education block grants are gone.

Support for teacher training is gone.

Money for school repairs is gone.

Additional assistance for charter schools is gone.

Support for universities will drop from $9,480 per pupil to $7,100, with state funding at the 2006 level.

Support for community college will drop the 2006 level.

KidsCare, which provides health-care insurance for 46,800 children, is gone.

Health-care insurance for low-income Arizonans will be cut back.

The Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections will be shut down completely, with responsibility for juvenile inmates transferred to the counties.

State employees are looking at 5 percent pay cuts.

Programs for the mentally ill are gone.

Support for grandparents caring for their grandkids is gone.

Programs that support the developmentally disabled are gone.

More to come.

Ciphurphace's song "Just a Microphone Check" was selected for a sponsored-songs program called "Playlist 7" by ReverbNation and Windows.

Here's more info from a press release. Note the first stage of the promo ends Monday, Jan. 18.

Who is Ciphurphace?

Imagine Confucius and Shakespeare in the recording booth reciting ill 16's after consuming four Red Bulls...Ciphurphace is the neighborhood rap star from Tucson aka The Soul Pueblo aka The Burnt Cactus, Arizona...he doesn't drive an expensive fast car...he doesn't rock jewels...he doesn't have a lot of dough in his pocket...he pens incredible lyrics and records effin' good music...and for some odd reason, people enjoy it...he looks weird and he rocks a GoodBeard like ZZ Top...if Hip-Hop was based on skills, he would get Young Jeezy props and he would have all the fans that Lil Weezy got.

What is Playlist 7?

Playlist 7 is about uncovering amazing emerging artists and letting music fans choose their 7 favorites each week.

"Each week, we'll serve up 50 new artists for you to sample. Fans of Windows have exclusive access to download their favorites and help us decide which bands we'll spotlight as next week's Featured Artists. Download up to 7 of your favorite tunes. The 7 most popular MP3s will be available to everyone next week, but only our friends get first choice."

Here's the link for the song:

JUST A MICROPHONE CHECK

http://www.reverbnation.com/c./a4/152/291360/Artist/291360/Artist/link

To check out the Phace in the Ciphur and to hear more music from Ciphurphace and Scorpioflo, check out these sites:

www.reverbnation.com/ciphurphace
www.myspace.com/jamesciphurphace
www.myspace.com/scorpioflo
www.myspace.com/effinsumbodies

Gov. Jan Brewer is releasing her budget today. Early forecasts call for deep, deep cuts.

As we forecast in The Skinny, U.S. District Court Judge Roslyn Silver may be prepared to do away with the matching-funds provision of Clean Elections. But it's not inconceivable that she could leave it in place for 2010, too.

The Range would not be sorry to see Clean Elections eliminated altogether. We have our reasons.