What a Difference a Year Makes!
One year ago the Dow was 5000 points higher than it opened today. Did I hear that right? Can this be? One year ago the Dow was at 14165! Now it is down 35%.
Even Cramer, the thoroughly entertaining (to me, anyway) and highly energized TV financial markets commentator, now says get out of stocks. Get out of stocks? Who’da thunk?
And, most of the rest of the world’s organized economies are in the same, sinking boat. Iceland faces national bankruptcy; Iceland, for God’s sake!—all 300,000 residents—who would all fit comfortably on the West Side of Los Angeles with plenty of room left over for the rest of us. And, they could leave their Winter wardrobes back home.
California’s Tax Machine
The California Taxpayers’ Association has released a second edition of Dave Doerr’s California’s Tax Machine, an up-to-date history of how California taxes its citizens. Doerr, chief tax consultant at Cal-Tax since 1987, started working for the Assembly in 1959 holding many positions, including chief consultant to the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee. The new edition, a year in the making, includes new information on the Davis and Schwarzenegger administrations’ tax policies along with updates on some of the historical material included in the 2000 first edition.
Doerr hopes any new tax commission set up by the Legislature or the governor reads through the book before beginning work. “You can’t really begin to fix things unless you know how they went wrong and what the problems are and how they developed. Then they start to see how they can get out.”
Doerr’s 800-page volume begins with the Spanish Rule in California but quickly gets into the tax policies of today and how they developed over the years. If one tax issue has stood out over time for Doerr, it has been trouble with the property tax starting in early statehood and running right through the Proposition 13 tax revolt. Doerr noted that a referendum in 1859 to split California in two was driven in large part by the heavy property tax burden in the southern part of the state. The issue of two Californias was transferred to Congress but was lost among rising tensions of the coming Civil War.
What Happened to Country First?
This nation is facing its worst economic period in generations as the GOP’s candidate is avoiding real issues and increasingly sounding like the grouchy grandparent you hate to visit.
Although he didn’t have the courage to bring up William Ayers in his debate with Barack Obama, John McCain and his running mate brought it up at every campaign appearance this week.
Despite being born after the 1960s, I have been familiar with the Weathermen’s despicable acts and know which Bob Dylan song inspired their name. Until this year, I had never heard of William Ayers, however, and I’ll bet Sarah Palin hadn’t either.
It appears that Obama’s and Ayers’ paths crossed as neighbors and opinion leaders involved with public policy in Chicago, but it doesn’t sound like they were "palling around" as Gov. Palin likes to say.