A Great Editorial On City Spending

I wanted to encourage readers to take a look at this article by Berkeley resident Barbara Gilbert.

I was surprised to see the strongly liberal Berkeley Daily Planet publish such a strong article in its entirety. Gilbert does an excellent job at describing the sorts of public-employee giveaways which bankrupted Vallejo and are doing the same thing to other East Bay cities.

My biggest confusion with this article is Gilbert's insistence that she supports Obama for president in spite of her seemingly strong understanding of the dangers of out-of-control liberal spending. Perhaps she is just fed up with Republicans in Washington, which is fair enough given the country's state.

Gilbert's editorial reminded me of another article I read in the Contra Costa paper this weekend regarding Democrats who have moved from California to traditionally red states such as Colorado and Nevada. These transplants, according to the article, moved there because of the high cost of living here in Calfornia.

The irony -- yes, I checked with my wife and "irony" is the right term for it -- is that these folks plan to vote for Democrats in their new homes. So, presumably within 10 or 20 years, they'll be fleeing again from a high-tax, high-cost locality to yet another spot. Perhaps they should consider the fact that it is at least partially their voting behavior which causes their high cost of living.

I guess some people never learn.

In Nevada, Government Actually Sometimes Says 'No'

I'm sure most EBC readers don't spend much time reading about Nevada politics. But if you did, you'd know that, like California, Nevada faces a budget crunch, and its legislature held a special session last weekend to resolve things.

California could learn a lot from the way Nevada handles these things. In short, they cut. A lot. And they balanced their budget.



I was pretty shocked this past weekend as I read the Nevada Appeal articles about the special session. From the peace and quiet of my Nevada HQ, I tried to imagine how such a situation would play out in Sacramento.

First, there's just absolutely no way the Democrats in the California legislature would even consider significant spending cuts without first lining up hundreds of demonstrators.

California is childish in this way. Our representatives repeatedly pick the most important and valuable public services, and as soon as any cuts need to be made, they tell us that those are the ones that will be cut. Then they line up teachers, cops and whoever else they can find to demagogue the issue still further.

Then, the key moment comes when folks like Don Perata trot out their demands to raise taxes. This suggestion always strikes me as hilarious in light of the fact that California already is number 6 nationwide  in per-household government spending. Nevada is number 43.

Oh, and did I mention that Nevada has no income tax? Must be nice. Move to Nevada, get a 10 percent pay raise.

One thing that few Californians realize is that we may actually be at the end of a period of tax rationality.

Democrats are currently just a few votes shy of the two-thirds majority they need in both houses of the legislature to pass a budget without any input from Republicans. After the 2010 census, they will re-draw the legislative boundaries, with predictable results.

I think it's a reasonable likelihood that the Democrats will eventually get their two-thirds majority, and then I would expect to see state income tax rates in excess of 15 percent. I see absolutely nothing in the state's liberal agenda that stands in the way of such an eventuality.

It's sad to see things go this way. This is especially true in light of our neighbors in Nevada.

It's not as if Nevada is some sort of far-right-wing backwater. Far from it, actually: Democrats are the majority in the Nevada state assembly. No, the difference is that Nevada actually has political give-and-take. This is something that's increasingly lacking in California.

One-party government is a disaster. Even Leftists should be able to understand this point, considering the federal government's problems under monolithic Republican rule.

California needs more conservatism to make it more like Nevada. Only then may California be saved from its own shortsightedness.