Congress did what it had to do, and then with a stroke of his pen so did President Barack Obama, avoiding a shutdown of the federal government -- for two weeks, anyway.

The U.S. Senate voted 91-9 Wednesday to pass a House bill that will fund the government for two more weeks, cutting $4 billion in spending in the process. Funds to keep the government running have only been appropriated through Friday. President Barack Obama ended the immediate tension by signing the bill into law late Wednesday afternoon and preventing a shutdown.

Gov. Rick Scott asked the Florida Supreme Court to deny a petition from state senators seeking to overturn his rejection of $2.4 billion in federal stimulus funds for a high-speed rail project.

Reiterating his opposition to the proposed Orlando-Tampa line and his authority to turn down funding, Scott submitted a 26-page response to the lawsuit filed Tuesday by Sens. Thad Altman, R-Melbourne, and Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa.

However, the Florida Supreme Court rules on state Sen. Thad Altman's case against Gov. Rick Scott, the Melbourne Republican has virtually assured himself another GOP fight when he stands for re-election in 2012.

"Thad Altman's chance for a primary challenger is 100 percent," said a Tallahassee-based Republican strategist speaking on background.

Though a dozen GOP senators signed a letter in support of the controversial high-speed rail venture, none of those Republicans signed on to Altman's lawsuit, which he filed with Democratic Sen. Arthenia Joyner.

When President Obama's budget came out in February, with the greatest expansion of federal spending in American history, some sycophantic media outlets like The Washington Post ridiculously tried to sell the concept that Obama was pushing "deep cuts." It was a publicity line that collapsed on itself within 24 hours.

The Democrats are doing nothing to rein in the spending that is leading America into bankruptcy. What the Republican leadership is proposing, with its minuscule cuts, is next to nothing.

A group of insurers is hoping to move a series of bills through the Legislature this year that tackle some of their industrys toughest problems in Florida.

Some of the bills, like those addressing suspicious sinkhole claims, have been filed and are working their way through the committee process; others, like those attempting to make Citizens Property Insurance actuarially sound, are still being drafted by legislators.

In what was billed as a bipartisan bid to counter "an abuse of power," two state lawmakers sued Gov. Rick Scott over his rejection of federal high-speed rail funds.

Sens. Thad Altman, R-Melbourne, and Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa, asked the state Supreme Court on Tuesday to order the governor to accept $2.4 billion in stimulus funds from Washington, D.C., to build a controversial Tampa-Orlando train line.

Put on the backburner a couple of years ago, the idea of swapping a sales tax increase for property tax cuts has emerged again in the Florida Legislature.

Bills filed in both chambers last week would boost the state sales tax by 2.5 cents to 8.5 percent, a 42 percent increase, while at the same time axing the states required property tax levy for education by more than $7 billion a year.