Someone asked this week whether we had been able to find a defining moment of the legislative session. Our candidate: It happened on March 2, Texas Independence Day, on the lawn of the Governor’s Mansion, when Gov. George W. Bush said officially that he’s pondering a presidential run.

At the end of the last legislative session, people were complaining about the ability of the most conservative House members to disrupt that chamber’s business. This session, the liberals have been in charge of the grenades, and they have found their own place as a spoiler in a system that historically likes to run on compromise and negotiation. As the Republicans have improved their ability to hold together a bloc of votes, the Democrats have slipped.

Democrats of both the native and national varieties (and Republicans with presidential ambitions) have been chipping away at Gov. George W. Bush for what they see as his failure to stake out a leadership position on the hate crime bill that got spiked by the Texas Senate. And their next line of argument is that Bush isn’t tuned into anything at all, at least not to anything that’s of concern to the Texas Legislature. That ain’t necessarily so.

If Carole Keeton Rylander had never said anything about money back at the beginning of the session, the state would be about where it is today in terms of the amount of money available for government spending and tax cuts.

We begin with an “if”: What happens if Gov. George W. Bush moves from the white mansion at 11th and Colorado in Austin to the larger digs at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C.? Well, unless he refuses to take the office, Lt. Gov. Rick Perry would move into the governor’s office.

We’re not sure where the rumor of a special session started, but we checked our Dear Diary entries for the last couple of legislative sessions, and the rumor is right on time. Time is running out, people are starting to worry about their legislation, and some desperate souls are starting to talk about the need for a special session if such-and-such isn’t dealt with during regulation play.

If you think the governor is getting hammered on his plans for the state’s huge financial surplus, you’re arguably right. But if you think he has a big political stake in the details of teacher pay and taxes, you’re probably wrong. All that matters in the end is the big picture.

The plan about a year ago was to dedicate the newest state office building – the one named after former legislator and parliamentarian Robert E. Johnson – before the legislative session. That completion date was moved several times, each date a little closer to the session, then to March 1, then to June 1, and finally, to late August or early September

We’ll start this tale by saying that when the House is charged about two months from now in the death of legislation on third parties being sued in tort cases, the Senate will have to be charged with aiding and abetting the murder. Maybe they didn’t mean to do it. But the Senate’s lack of speed has made it easy for the House opponents to whack the bill without taking much heat for it.

A lobbyist of some repute (take that either way you want to) pulled out a legislative calendar to make an interesting and graphic point: There are exactly five weeks between the end of the Easter legislative break and the day the House rules begin to brake legislative activity.