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ThatDaveGuy69 -> RE: Is the blade mightier than the pen? (7/26/2009 5:55:44 AM)
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I've never understood why California would have any sort of budget issues. They have one of the most profitable industries ever created: Hollywood. Every week it seems there's another movie that opens with a new box-office record. You'd think that some portion of those dollars would find their way back to Sacramento. Not to mention the income tax on all those mega-stars... And then there are all those hi-tech companies based in Silicon Valley. Throw-in a bunch of defense contractors, a thriving tourist industry, and the Disney comglomerate and ya gotta wonder where the state went wrong?
On the other hand, every time you blink an eye it seems someone has his hand out, demanding some new subsidy. My nurse firend was just in town with her Downs child and she's always telling me about the care she is "entitled" to for the little guy. She can, for example, leave him with a foster care home any time she needs to "get away". For her trip to visit firends and family here in the Midwest, CA picked up a portion of the tab for her to bring a sitter along, again so she would have some help with the little guy. Must be nice. I overheard part of her conversation with a couple of other nurse-type friends and she was going on about how the patient ration is, by state law, 5-to-1. That's no more than 5 patients for each nurse. Pretty damned amazing. I doubt the doctors have it so good. I'm sure there a tons of other such "extravagant" expenditures but everyone seems to have his hand out. And no one ever wants to pay for it.
We just got through a similar situation here in IL. The former gov left a huge financial mess. The current gov tried to push a combination of budget cuts and a tax increase. Yeah, the tax increase would suck but the alternative is cutting some very basic services. In the depths of my unemployment I tried to apply for State Aid. You have to be at the office around 6am to get in line. They open at 8 and by 10am they already have as many people as they can process in a day. So no, I never made it onto the welfare rolls.
I don't claim to have the answers but I know that ya gotta pay to play. Every service offered by the government, wether it's city, county, state, or federal, has got to be paid for. And the only form of income the government has is taxes. Yes, we all want lower taxes. But we love our government services, too. At what point do we start saying we just can't afford to do something or simply bite down hard and accept a tax increase?
Of course MY 1st step would be to repeal the obscene tax cuts for the rich. That would be the folks who are making over $350k per year. I don't know how much money that would generate but it sure seems like a good place to start. I think we've learned that "trickle down" simply does not work.
~Dave
(D-IL)
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