Jerry Brown, Your Messengers Are Killing Your Message
Gov. Jerry
Brown’s $12 billion tax plan will be defeated at the ballot box if he doesn’t
quickly take control over who is delivering his message. In the past few weeks,
former Assembly Speaker and current partner at Mercury Public Affairs, Fabian
Nuñez, and Assemblyman Gil Cedillo have made the media rounds promoting the
need for higher taxes, despite their recent personal controversies continuing
to weigh on people’s minds.
In late
December and mid January, Univision on its thirty-minute statewide political
show, Voz y Voto, aired some extensive interviews with both Nuñez and Asm.
Cedillo. They each discussed the
budgetary problems faced in California: the unemployment rates, the housing
crisis, whether business would flee the state if taxes were raised, and their
views on the current deficit.
As Nuñez
stated that, "we need to find creative ways to get revenue from those that have
it, to balance the budget," Asm. Cedillo was out promoting the view that,
"taxes are not high here" and that the only reason California voters recently
rejected tax increases was because "the truth is the public doesn’t know
reality."