< HOME  Wednesday, June 03, 2009

The Governator: "Our wallet is empty, our bank is closed, and our credit is dried up."



Governor pushes lawmakers for quick action on budget cuts

Los Angeles Times June 3, 2009

Excerpts from the article (fair use):

...Saying the national recession has brought about a "transformation of what services Sacramento can provide," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday pressed lawmakers for a swift resolution of the financial crisis that threatens the country's most populous state with insolvency.

"We are running out of excuses and we have run out of time," Schwarzenegger said in a rare speech to a joint session of the Legislature. "And the people have run out of patience." [....]

In the past, lawmakers have passed -- and Schwarzenegger has signed -- budgets that used borrowing and accounting maneuvers to push fiscal problems into subsequent years. Now, the governor said, the nation is watching how the state handles its projected $24-billion shortfall. He said the state must finally confront the problem head-on, without financial gimmickry.

"People are writing California off," he said. "They are talking about the end of the California dream. They don't believe that we in this room have the courage and the determination to do what needs to be done or that the state is even manageable." [...]

In his speech, Schwarzenegger said that although he despises hurting schoolchildren and firefighters and Alzheimer's patients, the state has no choice.

"Our wallet is empty, our bank is closed, and our credit is dried up," he said.

The governor, who was elected to solve many of the problems he now faces, implicitly acknowledged that he has little time to complete that mission before leaving office in a year and a half.

"I don't want to hand these problems to the next governor, and I know that you don't want to hand them to the next Legislature," he said.



Two words to the Governator:

NO SHIT!


The evident aftereffect of the elephant in the room -- Proposition 13. (1994 "Money" periodical article)

Profligacy, unmitigated illegal immigration and political corruption are three other heads of a mutant fiscal Godzilla breathing the fire of "right-wing anti-tax lunacy" that caused the administrative people of municipalities and counties to become so tight-fisted it shifted the local responsibility to the state to handle the massive fiscal budget head-on. Particularly K-12 and college public education administration. The cause of the myriad of regressive state and local tax rates to compensate for the budget shortfall imposed by Proposition 13 as a de facto straitjacket of government finance.

Despite Schwarzenegger state government's astonishingly drastic cuts of the essential services -- 80% of state park closure, wildfire prevention, subsidized drugs for HIV/AIDS & other terminal disease sufferers, care for the sick, disabled and elderly, domestic violence shelter, education grants for the poor and middle-class to continue attending college, etc -- the idiotic, incompetent and revoltingly selfish governor and legislators refuse to look at this obvious problem that literally and figuratively serve as a fiscal noose hanging the very life of California state in common sense governance and welfare & security of the people.

The corrupted and self-interested party of saboteurs fawn over Prop 13 as the holy doctrine in benefits that favor the corporate and selfish residential 78'ers, oblivious to the deadly and deleterious effects of the mind-bendingly awful tax law that will go down in history as the most infamous example of execrable and stupid law passed to benefit the few.

The infamy which will be instrumental in the destruction of the state of California.

Chickens will come home to roost. Don't go to the other states with a hat in hand panhandling for our hard-earned tax dollars to bail out the corrupt and inept California government that refuse to take responsibility, starting with eliminating corruption at legislative & administrative level (special interest) and repealing the disastrous tax law.

California people must wake up from the Prop. 13 nightmare by reforming or repealing the law at the state constitutional convention to re-write the state constitution (RepairCalifornia.Org) or California falls in anarchy as a veritably failed state.

___________

Update

The Bruin Standard (UCLA journal): A letter from the editor on California fiscal problem and what to do - June 3, 2009

Anarchy Comes to California: California will run out of cash in 14 days

Historical retrospective: From Pitchforks to Proposition 13 (NYT column, 10/5/2003)

5 Comments:

At Wednesday, June 03, 2009, Blogger qrswave said...

now u know why they call him the terminator...he plans to terminate the lives of everyone in California with the exception of the rich and filthy

can u expand a little on prop. 13?

not from CA, therefore not familiar with it.

 
At Wednesday, June 03, 2009, Blogger Nepos Libertas said...

Qrswave,

A summary of what Prop 13 is, as far as I understand it. Prop 13. was an initiative that was passed (64.8%) on June 6, 1978 to amend California state constitution as a permanent fixture (Article XIIIA, read it and see if you understand it as a trained attorney).

Article XIIIA is a corporate tax haven which caps residential and commercial properties at 1% for those who own properties circa 1978 with 2% annual tax rate for re-assessment of property value.

For comparison of the wild variance of property values in terms of property tax assessment post-Prop 13, check out the article for a photo diagram.

At your request, here is the list of articles that expound on Proposition 13. I did my research and am very certain it is Proposition 13 that will destroy California by sending it into the fiscal black hole.

First, reflecting your anger at Gov. Arnold for cut-and-slash budgets that leave vulnerable people gripping at the lifeline - enjoy this blog entry - As Arnold’s Political Career Dies, How Many Californians Will He And DiFi Sacrifice To His Three Big Lies?

Recommended reading: The Crushing Blow of Howard Jarvis

Recommended reading: "Prop 13 and its effects on Californians" (the first article is propaganda to inform the readers of the anti-tax extremists' fantasy view, then read the following two horror stories, hand-typed [some spelling errors] from older articles published in early-mid 90's.)

Recommended reading: Washington Post op-ed column California's budget problem: Prop 13" 5/29/09

Recommended reading: Column by San Francisco tax assessor - "Now What? Close state's largest tax loophole"

Recommended reading: "California's Budget Crisis And The Need To Repeal Prop. 13"

Recommended viewing what Prop 13 really is in a nutshell: Beverly Hills middle school PowerPoint presentation by two female teenage students (Google HTML cache)

Daily Kos diary "How Proposition 13 has created California's crisis"

(cont'd)

 
At Wednesday, June 03, 2009, Blogger Nepos Libertas said...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger FIRED Warren Buffett as an economic advisor the first week of office in 2003. Because Buffett suggested reforming or repealing Prop 13 that raised the ire of conservative advisors and legislators. List of articles related to Buffett/Prop 13. At the top is the article by Buffett that compares property taxes of the beachfront house he owns in CA to the houses owned in other states.

Richard Reeves' 5/29/09 syndicated column "The Late, Great State of California"

Calitics: Howard Jarvisism - A Tale Told By An Idiot (list of blog articles written by David Dayen on festering corruption & out of control deficit.)

California Failed Reform

California Nightmare (may be biased)

NYT Op-Ed Column "State of Paralysis" by Nobel Prize-winning economist Jew (may be "blame Republicans only/support hiking more tax as solution in the most taxed state in the Union" biased)

Op-ed: Is it time to rethink Prop 13?

LA Times: A face-lift for Prop 13?

The Legacy of Proposition 13 (long article)

Sacramento Bee editorial: Time to look at Prop. 13 again

Sac Rag: Repeal Prop 13!

I hope you and your readers come away better informed than ever, as we watch helplessly in horror as California reaches the point of fiscal oblivion that could lead to anarchy unprecedented in U.S. history.

Text of Article XIIIA (here and here)

Remember right-wing "anti-tax" extremism have hurt California state BIG TIME. Howard Jarvis was a cranky Mormon. I have a theory why the late Jarvis created Proposition 13 for pure self-interest -- and it's not just corporate tax.

It's about amassing as much income post-Prop 13 to contribute 10% or more (15, 20, 35, any rate when they feel like doling out their "donation" as mandated by Mormon scripture Doctrine & Covenants 119 drafted by founding con artist Joseph Smith to scare the cultists into obedient sheep if they want to go to heaven) in tithes and fast offerings to the Mormon Cult headquarter in order to reach the upper echelon of the Heaven called Celestial Kingdom to achieve becoming gods to lord over their own planets. Strictly my theory why influential Mormon crazies are running California state into the ground under the pretense of tax revolt. They want absurdly low tax to hoard money to themselves.

I posit my theory because the state of Utah is one of the "best managed" states in the Union due to fiscal conservatism by Mormon legislators and administrators. The Mormon Cult leaders beseech frugality repeatedly in the past, even at the recent April 2009 General Conference.

Frugality + hoarding = pay a portion to Mormon Cult headquarter to receive continuous blessing for a prize in Heaven.

Over 760,000 Mormons (as of 2006) live in California, mostly concentrated in Southern California.

Jarvisism have fucked California spectacularly with the nasty can of worms.

 
At Wednesday, June 03, 2009, Blogger Nepos Libertas said...

By the way, the properties protected under Prop 13 can change hands and still keep the benefit for the commercial entities and descendants of homeowners (owner sell house to offspring or relative and keep the benefit in "royalty guarantee" while younger homebuyers are sticked with the high property tax rate; the benefit essentially made the 78'er homeowners keep their properties forever until they pass away of old age unless signed over to relative to keep the benefit).

This causes housing shortage in some cases, especially in parts of LA County due to seniors *refusing* to sell their houses because of Prop 13 advantage, as far as I know from research.

The corporate exploited the "loophole" by property tax cap advantage; the result is hundreds of billions of dollars up to a trillion plus in potential taxed revenue gains lost over a generation.

Prop 13 is insane, I tell you.

Selfish homeowning assholes voted for Prop 13 because of inflated property value adjuct to increased emigration and immigration demand for land (20-22 million circa 1975-1978 according to bureau data). They fell for Howard Jarvis' con hook, line and sinker.

And these same assholes who have aged but not passed away still defend Prop 13 with fury. I encountered an angry "granny" on a forum and another man who protested that Prop 13 is to blame. They are not only narrow-minded but conservative extremist idiots who listen to Rush Limbaugh and other dicks too much.

 
At Wednesday, June 03, 2009, Blogger Nepos Libertas said...

Oops, broken links. Fixed.

"Prop 13 and its effects on Californians"

"How Proposition 13 has created California's crisis"

 

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