CA Steamin' - an article from the Wall Street Journal (long read)

Story originally in the Wall Street Journal, June 16, 2003:
California is still one of the best places in America to build a successful small business. All you have to do is start with a successful large one.
That’s the joke making the rounds these days on the left coast, where a $38 billion budget gap and other evidence of awful governance is fueling a populist revolt to toss Governor Gray Davis out of office.
A state-wide poll released last week found that, given the opportunity, more than half of California voters would oust Mr. Davis, whom they only re-elected last year. If organizers of a recall effort obtain the 900,000 signatures needed to qualify for the ballot, a special election could be held as early as this fall.
Many Californians are clearly fed up, and who can blame them? Mr. Davis, whose approval rating is only 38% among fellow Democrats, has been running his state’s government into the ground. Not long ago state residents had to suffer through an entirely avoidable energy crisis that resulted in actual brown-outs, a la the Third World. Now they’re facing a budget deficit that exceeds the gross domestic product of most countries.
When Governor Davis was first elected in 1998, he inherited a budget surplus of $12 billion. Tax revenues grew 28% during Governor Davis’s first term, well above inflation. But over the same period Sacramento’s spending went up 36%, setting the stage for the state’s current fiscal crisis once the economy slowed. Rather than cutting back on spending, or reforming the government, Mr. Davis is again protecting the political class by proposing higher taxes in a state that is already one of the most tax-crazy in the nation.
The governor wants to raise the sales tax by a penny, which will cost the typical family an extra $250 a year. The top 10% of earners in the state already pay 80% of all income taxes, but this isn’t progressive enough for Mr. Davis, who’s looking to increase the marginal income tax rate on the state’s highest earners to 11% from 9.3%.
Mr. Davis never got around to mentioning any of these plans during his re-election bid last year. He deceived voters about both the size of the problem and how he planned to fix it. If his duplicity is now angering voters, and they want to hold him accountable, that’s a lesson more politicians could stand to learn.
California’s recall measure was added to its constitution in 1911. It’s purpose is to give voters a way to remove a “dishonest, incapable or unsatisfactory” public servant. Opponents complain that a recall would undo an election, which Mr. Davis won in 2002 with 47% of the vote. But the process is entirely constitutional and was put in place for exactly this purpose. The threshold for signatures is set deliberately high, to prevent frivolous recall attempts – which is why no state official has ever been recalled.
Far from being an organized GOP effort, this populist revolt is shaking up elites in both parties. Democrats obviously don’t want voters to intrude on their dominance of state government. And the White House would prefer that Mr. Davis remain as a unpopular leader to enhance President Bush’s chances of carrying California in 2004.
But the political establishment has let down the voters too many times in the recent past. The Democrats have gerrymandered themselves into a legislative majority that answers less to the voters than to powerful interest groups – trial lawyers, greens and especially public employee unions. The GOP is also at fault for being too divided to mount any serious opposition.
The echoes of Proposition 13 are deafening here, and instructive. Passed overwhelmingly by Californians almost precisely 25 years ago, that taxpayer revolt was also a response to entrenched and unaccountable government. The spending-limit requirements that followed put the state in good stead for most of the 1980s. But in 1990 the state’s political class finally got the voters to pass Proposition 111, which effectively removed all spending restraints and made possible Republican Governor Pete Wilson’s massive tax increase in 1991. The inmates have been running the asylum ever since.
It’s true that if the recall makes it to the ballot, the election transition could be messy. California’s next governor could win with a small plurality, or voters could replace Mr. Davis with another tax-and-spend liberal who’s unwilling to restore fiscal discipline. But the consequences could hardly be worse than the incompetent status quo.
It was Thomas Jefferson who said that a revolution every generation or so has its uses. Democracy by initiative and recall isn’t pretty, and it sometimes makes mistakes, but it is a useful balance to the tendency of modern government to become controlled by unaccountable political elites. A little revolution is just what California needs.

you can read a bunch more articles here
http://www.recallgraydavis.com/News.asp#News52

Politicans have a short memory. They forget [some would like to] the tax revolt of Prop. 13 and there is noise in Sac. to overturn 13. Just what we need, to give the tax and spenders a open account for more spending. These idiots just don't get it. They cannot have a blank check to spend any way they wish. We need accountability now. They say they know better how to spend our money than we do. Arrogant bastards. Next I suppose we are to just send them our paychecks with our endorsement on the back. It will end when we vote these bastards out but not before. burningm

The problem are the ignorant people. I had a conversation with a family acquaintance just after Davis was elected. She gave me a bad time because I'm a registered republican and that Davis won. I asked why she voted for him and she said "because I'm a Democrat."
When I asked if that was the only reason she said yes. I asked if she had even bothered to look at his track record and she said no.
I then said "it's people like you that are running this state into the ground."
in this case, ignorance is not bliss....

Cas, Nobody ever said Democrats are smart. :D :D

Keep in mind, everyone is entitled to their political opinion, it is a free country afterall. It's just that being a democrat is the WRONG opinion to have! :D

Good news. The recall for ol Grey-out Davis almost has enough votes to make the ballot. Counting starts on Monday!
I remember when the recall effort stated Davis' smug S.O.B. press secretary said the effort was backed by "a small bunch of sore losers." Well, almost a millon registered voters sign the recall petition already so not such a small group after all.
I hope we don't get another left-wing nutcase to replace him! If so, Cali is going to be dead-last in the economic recovery department.
All the majority ever talks about is raising our taxes to solve our problems. When has raising your taxes ever solved your problems?

Gray Davis is really only the start. There are quite a few other whackos in power in Sac also.
I think California pretty much needs governmental reform. I know, I've got wishful thinking going on but if there's going to be a positive turn around, that's what we need.
If whoever gets in there says they need a one time donation of $100.00 per person in Ca to help out, I'd probably be all for it. It sure would be better than raising our taxes again.

What we need is a state that has more balance between public and private sectors.There are so many people who work for the government in our state that the concept of free enterprise is lost. We have regulations governing every facet of our lives and specialized regulaters to enforce them. Do you realize that we have cops for air, water, food, sanitation, travel,and that there is a permit or license required for the use of any of them. They all have staffs, budgets, offices and fleets. I think one answer is going to a 3 month legislature. Do their duty then go back to their districts and live and work with what they have put into effect. The frustration of dealing with this whole mess is just overpowering and frustrating and mabe therein lies the seeds of revolution. When they hand out the AK's I get the DMV!

Lets not for get they are about to up our car registration 3 times the amount we are paying now. burningm I think it is time Gray Davis got a real job and had to work like the rest of us.