Previously the Governor told us,”Pass Prop. 58, and deficit spending will be a thing of the past”. Today the deficit, with Prop. 58, is $50 billion and growing. In 1979, we were told pass Prop. 4, the Gann amendment, and we will control deficit spending–it took Sacramento ten years to change it, to allow bigger and better deficits.
The current effort, Prop.1A, has a loophole, it allows the Governor, for any reason to declare an emergency, with no appeals, to get at the “rainy day fund”. In other words, the vote of the people and the legislature can be overturned by one person, the Governor. Do you want to have one person hold your paycheck and bank account hostage to special interests? That is what Prop.1A does.
In fact, the reason Prop. 1A is now losing is that the word has been received by the voters–Sacramento is lying to them. The ballot summary does not mention the $16 billion tax increase. It does not make clear that for no reason the Governor can overturn the rainy day fund.
Next, the people now understand that if Prop. 1A passes nothing stops Sacramento from raising more taxes. We already know that in the one month since the passage of the budget, the State has gone another $8 billion in deficit. No one believes the Governor or the legislative leaders did not know this was coming.
Our Governor has gone on TV to promote a national gas tax, he has told us he supports an expansion of the sales tax–to doctors, attorneys, hospital visit, barbers, all services.
The passage of Prop.1A will give the Sacramento politicians the “approval” for further tax increases. On May 20th, the State deficit, even with the passage of all the ballot measures, will be north of $10 billion–and must be handled. Then, if the measures had passed, the legislature will be told the people “want” higher taxes.
Since Prop.1A allows tax increases to be counted toward allowable spending, the higher the taxes, the more the spending. In conjunction with Prop. 1B, 1A will allow $16 billion in tax increases and Prop. 1B allows $9 billion in spending cuts “give backs”–a $25 billion swing, adding to the pressures on the “spending cap”.
In fact, we already have a spending cap in place that could work. It is called the “legislature”. If they continue to pass budget increases, without funding identified, deficits will happen. Time has caught up with them.
The Governor has increased spending by 44% in five years, now he wants the voters to tell him to stop? We have, as of June 30, 2008 a debt of $114 billion, plus the new deficit. The State has over $200 billion in unfunded pension and health care liabilities.
California is in trouble. Instead of easily avoided “spending caps” and taking money from families, our leaders need to do the hard work, cut spending, control the special interests (ending union only agreements for infrastructure projects would save 15% of the cost. Allowing vouchers and charter schools would save 20% of the cost of government education—hard work, but true reform)
In the end, the people deserve better from those we elect. The ballot measures create phony “caps”, tax increases, take excess taxes that should be returned to the families of California and used to cover up deficits).
May 19th ballot measures are why folks no longer trust government or elected officials.
By misleading the public, by not mentioning the $16 billion tax increase and more, Sacramento deserves the Tea Parties and voter revolt. On May 20, we will return to a California where the voters have a place at the table: just as we had in June, 1978, when the same folks behind the May 19th election told us California would fall over the cliff if we passed Prop. 13
During the Revolutionary War we were told that sometimes the Tree of Liberty needs the blood of patriots to nourish it. Today, all we need is a good voter revolt to nourish economic liberty. P.T. Barnum would love these ballot measures.