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Jul 24, 2008, 15:59 GMT
Schwarzenegger may slash paychecks to solve budget crisis
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Older Talkback
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Government is so bogus. If they really wanted to solve a budget problem and reduce taxes they would simply outsource the clerical work to India and China and put all their forms on a web server.
For example: Go to a web site and fill out a marriage form and click a button to get married. Thus the Justice Of The Peace can be obliterated from the payroll along with the other circa 1800s job functions.
This minimum wage stunt is just that ... a stunt. Arnold likes the spot light. He needs to sign the bill reducing wages while on a motorcycle and jumping over 20 cars while going through three flaming hoops. If you are going to act like a politician then you might as well look like a politician.
...he's acting like a republican.
'...he's acting like a republican.'
If they took my suggestion then homosexuals can get married faster too, and the lock on marriage ceremonies by catholic priests can be broken. Everyone can just do it online and dispense with bogus expensive meaningless ceremonies that are both bigoted and exclusive. Then homos, catholics, muslims, etc. will be treated equal. Now all we have to do is outsource the federal tax and benefit codes so that the feds can't lock out homos from marriage benefits.
Government is all about cronyism whether it is Republicans or Democrats.
However Republicans, as it turns out, have been the biggest spenders and deficit building group of stooges as of late.
Once again we see the ineffiency of our elected officials. Eliminating non-essential overtime and laying off 21,000 part time workers would certainly help. If you have observed the D.M.V(mass huddle to solve the smallest problem)or Cal Trans (5 people to plant a tree) and many other examples of waste. WE don’t have a revenue problem, WE HAVE A SPENDING PROBLEM!!!!
My fellow Californians. We did this to ourselves. We voted for weak leaders. We voted for short-sighted propositions. We allowed special interests and lobbyists to manipulate our fears and insecurities. We believed in unlimited opportunities and wealth. Let's take our bitter medicine now, or else a catastrophe is inevitable and there will be greater collateral damage. If you haven't done so yet, start saving. There will be opportunities to buy into CA when it collapses. It's a good long-range plan, because Ca will survive, wiser, more frugal and more efficient after the collapse.
The state has been increasing it's budget by almost twice it's revenue increase for years. We faced this situation about 15 years ago and the politicians did not learn then, so they just continue to spend and promise like drunken sailors. The only group of employees who have grown in the past 10 years in California have been government employees so now the bill has to be paid. Unlike a business, government seems to run at 100% efficiency, but how about laying off 10% of the employees, especially from the 'non-essential' depts. And if they are non-essential, why do we have them?
Could there be a much more appropriate and effective strategy taken by California (and other states) when elected officials can't agree to stop disagreeing? Just suspend pay and perks for every legislator, judicial and executive branch elected person for every day that goes beyond their state constitution deadline for approving annual budgets? We’re seeing too much irresponsible state (and federal) government ineffectiveness? Maybe a public initiative should be enacted to put an end to their political inability to compromise and agree on essential requirements for being elected representatives of the people who put them in office?
I think it is high time to retrench some of our state unproductive workers. To hell with the union. They drove our economy and jobs to the ground. Comparing to the private sector our state workers are overpaid not only in paychecks but benefits. What do the rest of us get.. poor services from the state. All our taxes goes to nothing! It is not how much we pay in taxes it is how much we get in return. All these years we are screwed by taxes and the people governing us and the people who are suppose to provide us the service. It is time they all pay for it. Time to retrenched.
Let's put this idea before the State's taxpayers on the next ballot coming up. Let the people vote and they will vote to stop this atrocious waste of money. I'm pretty sure the People of this great state will vote to eliminate the trough these people have been sucking from. Many state workers brag about their vacation time, their many paid days off, and their travel perks. Not to mention their pensions at 80% of their pay. It has to stop. Our founding fathers never intended public service to be what it's become. Work for the public good for a year and then back to the real world and its real economy. Good idea Governor!
'WE don’t have a revenue problem, WE HAVE A SPENDING PROBLEM!!!!'
YES!!!!!! And it is a Republican spending problem.
This is only a threat to get the legislature to get off their asses, since these employees get paid once a month. If the Legislature acts, no one receives a pay cut - they checks won't yet be issued.
I don't care which party Arnold belongs to - he's apolitical when it comes to running the State. He's just standing his ground as governor.
We could go back in time to Jarvis/Gann Prop. 13 and how that massive tax cut set up these deficits; but that would kick off a very long thread. It does point out the damage of massive tax cuts, no matter how politically appealing they are at the time.
At a time with the financial crises we now face, offering tax cuts, including the stupid idea of taking revenue out of infrastructure with a pander of 18 cents a gallon relief, is completely irresponsible - and that included Sen. Clinton when SHE raised the issue to buy votes. we are long past the point where ADDED economic growth from a tax cut generates a net revenue increase.
California cannot run a deficit, and the one they're forecasting right now is huge - something has to be done about it.
If Washington operated under these rules, we'd have to have been a lot smarter about Iraq, as one imaginary example. Between the Iraq adventure and the potential damage from FNMA, etc., Bush could end up more than doubling the Nation Debt in his miserable 8 years.
So much for Fiscal Conservatism.
@CA Resident says...Jul 24th, 2008 - 20:11:39
I said:
'WE don’t have a revenue problem, WE HAVE A SPENDING PROBLEM!!!!'
You said
YES!!!!!! And it is a Republican spending problem.
I say:
You obviously must live in Belgium. Definitely not California. California legislature is made up of:
32 Republicans
48 Democrats
While our Governor is designated a Republican he is a RINO (Republican in name only) there are 25 Dem senators, and 15 Republicans. This is the Democrat majority, it has been for years so the spending problem is mainly, mostly theirs. Spend, TAX, spend, TAX and Spend some more... As a true resident of Ca. I witness the total socialism of our state and its potential ruin by this liberal, social engineering, Dem majority.
I do think how ever the Republicans should be doing more in the state to stop these dems and fault them for not putting an end to the spending by the dems.
Below is the current Senate leadership 7 dems, 5 Rep
President pro Tem Don Perata (D)
Assistant President pro Tem Leland Yee (D)
Majority Leader Gloria Romero (D)
Dem Caucus Chair Carole Migden (D)
Majority Whip Minority Leader Dave Cogdill (R)
Rep Caucus Chair George Runner (R)
Minority Whip Tom Harman (R)
President pro Tem Don Perata (D)
Assistant President pro Tem Leland Yee (D)
Majority Leader Gloria Romero (D)
Dem Caucus Chair Carole Migden (D)
Majority Whip Minority Leader Dave Cogdill (R)
Rep Caucus Chair George Runner (R)
Minority Whip Tom Harman (R)
Democratic Caucus Republican Caucus
Senate Rules Committee
Don Perata (D), Chairman
Jim Battin (R), Vice-Chair
Gilbert Cedillo (D)
Robert Dutton (R)
Alex Padilla (D)
Don Perata (D), Chairman
Jim Battin (R), Vice-Chair
Gilbert Cedillo (D)
Robert Dutton (R)
Alex Padilla (D)
All Senate Democrats 25 total
District 2 - Pat Wiggins
District 3 - Carole Migden
District 5 - Michael Machado
District 6 - Darrell Steinberg
District 7 - Tom Torlakson
District 8 - Leland Yee, Ph.D.
District 9 - Don Perata
District 10 - Ellen Corbett
District 11 - Joe Simitian
District 13 - Elaine Alquist
District 16 - Dean Florez
District 20 - Alex Padilla
District 21 - Jack Scott
District 22 - Gil Cedillo
District 23 - Sheila Kuehl
District 24 - Gloria Romero
District 25 - Edward Vincent
District 26 - Mark Ridley-Thomas
District 27 - Alan Lowenthal
District 28 - Jenny Oropeza
District 30 - Ron Calderon
District 32 - Gloria Negrete McLeod
District 34 - Lou Correa
District 39 - Christine Kehoe
District 40 - Denise Ducheny
All Senate Republicans 15 total
Aanestad, Sam (4)
Ackerman, Dick (33)
Ashburn, Roy (18)
Battin, Jim (37)
Cogdill, Dave (14)
Cox, Dave (1)
Denham, Jeff (12)
Dutton, Robert (31)
Harman, Tom (35)
Hollingsworth, Dennis (36)
Maldonado, Abel (15)
Margett, Bob (29)
McClintock, Tom (19)
Runner, George (17)
Wyland, Mark (38)
CA ResidentJul 24th, 2008 - 22:52:49
@CA Resident says...Jul 24th, 2008 - 20:11:39
I said:
'WE don’t have a revenue problem, WE HAVE A SPENDING PROBLEM!!!!'
You said
YES!!!!!! And it is a Republican spending problem.
==================
People vote on what they're getting back spending on. That why tax cuts are an inducement - money in your pocket. That's why Jarvis/Gann went through - simple greed on the part of the voters.
Now, the chickens are coming home to roost, and the one-time CA surplus is no more. Now, the bills are coming due. This is not a one-sided political issue (as with Bush's GOP majority for 6 years booming the National Debt, and no vetoes in that period) - CA is a major economy, having the same problems as many COUNTRIES do. Except, that unlike Bush, CA cannot run deficits from year to year.
Be that as it may, you still have a Republican't as Governor. That makes it a Republican problem.
Sure CA has a liberal Republican governor who has no control over the spending of the socialist democrat legislature and senate. I guess that is why he is forcing the do nothing but spend and tax democrats to give him a budget. Unfortunately he will probably cave as he is a dem at heart.
CA needs Tom McClintock for Gov.
Well, maybe not broke, but the state is heading into the new fiscal year without a budget -- and, with no spending plan in place, California is running out of money to pay its bills. The Democrat majority wants to spend money it does not have. The State Treasurer's Office estimates there could be a real cash crunch in a few weeks.
The short-term hang-up is the Constitutional requirement that the Legislature must submit a balanced budget (the deadline for getting that done -- June 15 -- was missed). But there's a $15.2 billion deficit that has to be erased -- sometime, somehow. And that can't happen without an up-tick in revenues, a cut in spending or both.
There will be a lot of surprised people,try to guess the 'exact day and time the budget will have passed through both houses of the Legislature.' Guesses will range from late last month to January 2009 to 'when hell freezes over.'
That's not merely because the funding gap is so large and the sputtering economy isn't doing anything to help close it. The Democrats are willing to raise taxes (not so much on their constituencies) to help balance the budget, and Republicans firmly oppose that. Or because the GOP wants deep spending cuts -- the better to shrink Big Government and most Democrats view that as anathema, or their loss of power over the people of California.
The reality is that the compromise necessary to produce a budget is nearly impossible, because of structural problems embedded in the budget process and because of today's highly partisan political environment.
Republican legislators revel in the 2/3 legislative vote required to pass a budget. California is only one of three states that require a 'super majority.' (The others are Rhode Island and Arkansas, states not nearly as large, complex or expensive as California -- whose total budget of $145 billion is roughly 13 times as large as Rhode Island's and Arkansas’ combined!)
The good news for the legislature's GOP minority is that the Democratic majority alone can't pass a budget without Republican votes. The budget is one of the few policy areas where the legislative minority has an impact. In the past, a spate of healthy quid pro quos and twisted arms eventually led to closure (although not very often before the budget deadline passed). Those days appear to be over. California Democrat politicians see a greater risk in compromise than in holding out to appease their party's base.
The legislative maps drawn by Sacramento lawmakers after the 2000 census guaranteed districts safe for the incumbent party -- Democrat. With victory in November usually guaranteed, the big prize became winning the primary. And except for a brief blip, California's primaries remain essentially closed to the opposite party -- Republicans. The Democratic primary electorate looks decidedly liberal and the GOP primary electorate decidedly conservative. So Democratic legislators tilt left to avoid a primary challenge and Republicans tilt right -- making real give-and-take almost impossible.
The 2/3 vote requirement also means no one -- not even the Democratic majority, can be held accountable for blocking the budget, or raising taxes, or cutting spending -- or crafting a rational document. So it's easy for everybody -- including the Governor who tilts left, to point the finger of blame at everybody else and nobody cleans up the budget mess.
In 2004, Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks), an unyielding fiscal conservative, astonished Sacramento by proposing a budget reform package that included a simple majority vote to pass a budget, which, he insisted, would allow voters to hold the Democratic legislative majority fully accountable for excessive spending.
California's draconian term limits contribute to that lack of accountability, and are partly responsible for the state's love affair with bonding authority. Democrats can hold their party's ideological line on new taxes and more spending and still get the short-term political gain from funding threatened programs, leaving the longer-term economic pain to their successors.
What all this means is that when -- and if it's done, this year's budget will emerge held together by chewing gum and chicken wire. The political will and the political necessity just aren't there to do anything more.
@A ResidentJul 24th, 2008 - 23:42:07
Be that as it may, you still have a Republican't as Governor. That makes it a Republican problem.
========================================
That's how Putin ran the place. This is America. Get with the program.
It's a problem for the residents of CA - even those too young to vote. In an election year, there might as well be the Sunni and the Shia in the legislature. The difference in Iraq is that one side actually walks out.
Imagine if our country was formed 5 years ago, and we asked the Democrats, Republicans, and Independents to meet at Independence Hall to draft a Constitution. The mind boggles.
there are so many illogical statements and self contradictory sentences in your post that, to put it bluntly, it sucks. Only a Republican't like yourself would think that it makes sense.
It is the Legislature that passes a budget and they have failed, not Arnold.
I vote for the Governor to take a temporary pay cut of, let's say, minimum wage. Basically, it is going to take the tough sacrifices of the residents of California to recover from the economic crisis. You are not alone, the rest of the country will need to pull together as well.
...yep, it sure is a republican probleam. Most republican problems are made by liberals for them to clean up. This one is no different.
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