The match is over at the Capitol

You ever watch one of those boxing matches where the combatants spend much of their time dancing around the ring and jabbing into the other person’s gloves?

Then, out of the blue, someone unloads an upper cut that kind hits the opponent, but not square in the face. The boxer stumbles around for a second, leans into the ropes, but bounces back for more dancing, more jabbing?

When it’s all over, each boxer is bouncing around. Each one thinks he’s won because it’s really not that clear. Everyone’s looking at the judges to hear for a winner.

Yeah, I guess that’s like a lot of boxing matches, isn’t it?

That was 2019 in the state Capitol with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer feeling out her new authority with a couple of Republican legislative leaders who were trying out their first go at running a majority caucus.

So, let’s go through the year in rounds:

First Round: Whitmer reshuffles the Department of Environmental Quality and calls it the Department of Environment, Great Lakes & Energy. In the process, she scraps three environmental oversight committees Republicans and former Gov. Snyder threw into the department for business interests.

Republican leaders rejected the move. Whitme revised her reorganization without removing the committees. Everyone’s happy.

Winner: Republican Legislature.

Second Round: Republican legislative leaders dust off their old advice and consent powers to run Whitmer’s cabinet and other high-level appointees through confirmation interviews.

Good background research was done. Good questions were asked. The appointees did well in their interviews. Advice and Consent Committee Chairman Pete Lucido couldn’t find anything wrong with any of them. All Whitmer appointees took office without issue.

Winner: Whitmer.

Third Round: Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield made lowering auto insurance their No. 1 priority. Their solution was giving drivers the option of not buying the personal injury unlimited lifetime benefit, among other things.

Whitmer’s allies at the Michigan Association of Justice didn’t like it. But the final law included mandatory rate rollbacks. Who can be against that?

Winner: Republican Legislature

Fourth Round: Republicans politely declined raising gasoline taxes 45 cents to fix Michigan’s highways and freeways as Whitmer proposed. The Republicans played the “Waiting for Godot” card, promising much of the year to uncork a road funding plan that never came.

Chatfield’s idea of taking sales tax off gasoline and then raising gas taxes for roads by an equivalent amount had promise. It fell apart right about the time folks wanted to know how they were going to replace the lost funding for schools and local governments.

Paying the nation’s highest taxes on a gallon of gas doesn’t sound great, but something is better than nothing.

Winner: Whitmer.

Fifth Round: Whitmer based her entire Fiscal Year 2020 budget on the gas tax increase passing. When that fell apart, so did any other real alternative to raise additional money for K-12 schools, universities, local governments and other programs.

Whitmer’s threw a haymaker with her $947 million line-item veto cuts and $550 million in administrative board transfers, but it was more of a glancing blow, as opposed to a direct hit.

Once everyone got done posturing and started getting serious on putting together a budget, the spending was what Whitmer the status quo, and the elimination of a bunch of boutique programs that most folks weren’t sad to see go away.

Also, the lawmakers agreed to put into law a requirement that they must present budgets to the governor by July 1 going forward.

Winner: Whitmer.

Sixth Round: Mixed into the fifth round was this back-and-forth about the future of the State Administrative Board’s power to move around money within department budgets without legislative approval.

Shirkey insisted on legislative oversight, which he got. Lawmakers will now need a head’s-up before the Ad Board starts moving around money. Allegedly, a provision stuck into the budget gives lawmakers the power to reject future objectional transfers. Whether that’s for real may be something a court decides later.

Winner: Republican Legislature.

I guess that makes 2019 a 3-3 draw? Well, at least the feeling-out process is out of the way.

(Kyle Melinn of the Capitol news service MIRS is at melinnky@gmail.com.)