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The latest plan by Pennsylvania's top legislators to end the state's 2 1/2-month budget impasse was rejected by Gov. Ed Rendell on Thursday as inadequate to avert another deficit, although efforts to win his backing continued.

Senate Republican leaders met with Rendell on Thursday night after the Democrat threatened to veto legislators' evolving plan to underwrite a nearly $28 billion budget and fill the state's multibillion-dollar shortfall in tax collections.

The meeting was cordial, but did not bridge a $200-million to $300-million gap between what the sides believe can be collected in the future from the taxes, fees and other revenue sources in the plan, said Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi, R-Delaware.

"Frankly, at this late date, there's been a lot of analysis, it's not going to be, as I said, an easy task to try and resolve those differences, but we're committed to making a diligent effort to do that," Pileggi said.

On Thursday morning, Rendell dismissed the plan sent to him hours earlier as inadequate to get through the recession, sustain crucial programs and avoid a major tax increase or deficit next year.

"I am still holding out for them to get real, understand that we can't have a totally painless process and put in the type of recurring revenue and the amount of recurring revenue that will balance this year's budget and next year's budget," Rendell said at an unrelated event in Bensalem.
Rendell's blistering comments were carried by the Pennsylvania Cable Network. With the sides criticizing each other almost daily in public, Pileggi said he asked Rendell to get personally involved in the talks in hopes of speeding an agreement. Rendell agreed, he said.
The Democratic governor's stance has remained the same since last week, when leaders of the House Democrats and of both parties in the Senate unveiled the original version of their plan. House Republicans do not support the plan, saying it raises spending too high and relies on tax increases that they oppose.
Pennsylvania has been without a comprehensive budget since the fiscal year began July 1 and is the last state still fighting over its annual spending plan. Without money flowing from the state treasury, the private organizations and businesses that make up Pennsylvania's social safety net are taking out loans, laying off workers and shuttering services to stay afloat.
Many details about the plan remain under wraps.
Dealmakers are counting on higher taxes on businesses and cigarettes and more money from expanding legalized gambling and gas exploration in state forests to help balance the recession-ravaged budget. They also propose tapping more than $1.5 billion in reserves.
dell's earlier proposals to raise taxes on income, the extraction of natural gas and sales of cigars and smokeless tobacco were rejected by legislators.
In the meantime, some members of the House and Senate rank-and-file are expressing reservations about it.
One House Democrat, Rep. Dan Frankel of Allegheny County, called for the budget agreement to close "loopholes" that exempt sales of sales of cigars and smokeless tobacco from being taxed , taxes that nearly every other state collects.
Another House Democrat, Rep. Greg Vitali of Delaware County, said Thursday he would vote against the plan because it slashes environmental regulation by nearly 25 percent while allowing an expansion of drilling in state forests to generate more revenue.
"We cannot balance this year's budget at the expense of our environment," Vitali said.

Female smokers undergoing cardioversion for atrial flutter had more recurrent atrial arrhythmia.

 

 Smoking may be associated with a greater risk of atrial arrhythmia recurrence in women following cardioversion, and a higher risk of death in men, according to research published in the Sept. 1 issue of the American Journal of Cardiology.

Masayoshi Kinoshita, M.D., of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., and colleagues analyzed data from 1,424 patients undergoing cardioversion for atrial flutter over a six-year period. The mean age was 70 years, and 64 percent of the subjects were men.

Among women, the researchers found that current smokers were more likely to have recurrent atrial arrhythmia (hazard ratio, 1.71). Women's arrhythmia recurrence rate at one year was 58 percent in nonsmokers and 76 percent in current smokers. This association wasn't seen in male smokers. However, among men, current smokers had a higher risk of death after cardioversion (hazard ratio, 1.93).

"Several factors could account for the disparate results we found among men and women. First, an association between atrial arrhythmia recurrence and smoking might not have been seen in men because the men who smoked were more likely to die; thus, their death might have precluded documented atrial arrhythmia recurrence. Also, the men in our patient group were more likely than women to have coronary artery disease and, thus, they were at a greater risk of recurrent infarction and ventricular arrhythmias in association with cigarette use," the authors write.