They're all about majority rules but then create laws demanding a super majority to run a society.

Seriously, why must you always find a way to blame liberals? For being ideologically driven to want to pay for the services we receive?

Conservatives are the problem in California as they are everywhere. They set the whole country on fire and now they sit back and gleefully trip those running to put it out. Their goal has always been the destruction of government. They have no place in civilized society.

The sooner we vocalize openly and get beyond the fear of confronting those destructive miscreants or fearing sounding too harsh the sooner we can defeat them.

>One of the reasons we out here in Real America are sitting here amused at the collapse of California is in your post. Look at your post. Think about it. I know it's painful to think, but try.

Let's see -- could it be because California gave more money to the Federal government than it received while many "real american" states got more than they gave. Now would be a good time for the net takers to give some back, don't you think?

But, of course, the writer is right. It is all the fault of the average California citizen. None of the problems have to do with the whole Enron scandal of a few years back ('member that) or the powerful lobbies that have kept sensible reforms from being passed. Nope it's my fault. All righty then . . .

I would pay you for your wonderful editing job, but all I have are these IOUs...

no charge.

after all, I'm a 21st century journalist ;^0

To be a nation, a country's citizens must have a consensus on fundamental matters. California exemplifies the sad fact that in many essential areas of social or societal ethics, our entire country lacks consensus.

you can still take the drivers test in 26 different languages.

Don't Californacate me!

Notwithstanding badcat's praise for my editing abilities, I didn't change one word, word order, or even a single letter, of the original post.

All I did was to space things out a little bit.

Why did I do it? I dunno...maybe psychosurgery would help my case.

"What does a writer do? A writer writes." Norman Mailer

We can't explain it.

If your "real state" is east of CA and W. of Nebraska it probably wouldn't exist in its present state w/o massive federal subsidies for water,roads etc. Most of what I hear said about "real" states where people do "real" things is real bullshit.

California has been a contributor state - one of those that pays more in taxes than it gets in services - for a very long time. We've been funding the welfare and services needed for those nice little red states that do the opposite - pay less in taxes than they take in services.

We've got some trouble now - and yep, prop 13 - something in place since before I was born - is a part of it. You want me to build a time machine to vote against it? Or can I hope that little 1/3rd who is willing to see the state go down in flames before they vote for a budget would actually listen to me (they haven't).

So - we can cave to the blackmail of the 1/3rd, or we can hope to keep pushing for a rational budget and have public pressure cause them to fold.

I tried writing something about your whining but the sheer fatuous ignorance of your position is beyond responding to. Repealing Prop 13's property tax limitations are the third rail of tax reform for the same reason that child-labor is the third rail of juvenile correction. You can't even suggest it! Because it's mind-blowingly stupid, ignorant, and irrelevant.

A budget deficit of $16 billion represents less than 1% of the state's gross product. That's not a real problem, it's a fake problem, promoted by grandstanders of various stripes.

The idea that transient land-speculation should be allowed to force three quarters of the population to move every couple years is fine for Kansas where no one wants the land and it's all interchangeable. But every civilized place needs a way to control the insanity.

California's budget has exactly one problem: corrupt politicians. Unless you count credulous voters. And exactly one solution: collapse. Because lord knows you won't see the politicians and their masters releasing a penny of their complex graft schemes before then. And you won't see honest ones making significant headway against the schemers.

I'll bet you anything that even after a complete financial collapse and state bankruptcy, somehow the graft will end up protected while all the vital services fail.

Just because a graft scheme has been in place for seventy years doesn't mean it needs to continue. If you actually care, take the time to find out how much money is involved and where it actually goes. Question the wisdom of it all. It costs more in the end to borrow than to raise taxes. So why do we borrow? Who profits?

Your letter was a genuine tonic. As a fellow native Californian of a certain age, I too can remember what the state was like both pre- and post-Proposition 13. Most people today don't remember that there were two other tax proposals on the ballot, both more reasonable. But people were in a dyspeptic mood and decided to eat their fiscal seed corn. And we've all been suffering ever since. After 31 years it's getting pretty damned old.

he can't do any more damage than the strudel eater. Kennedy has been whispering too many sweet liberalisms in his ear.

As Whigs, Americans give up a portion of their natal sovereignty to the larger community in exchange for some personal advantage; generally a simplification of life. It is advantageous to have a shared traffic code, rather than we each following our own.

Taxes—which in a Tory community are theft imposed on the serfs by the Sovereign enforced by their armies—are in a Whig community supposed to be just what we freely give in cash or kind so that our societal dreams are realized. The legislature has an implicit requirement to spend our money wisely and well.

The problem is that graft happens, and a clever graft in addition to benefitting the criminals to some great extent benefits many additional voters to some tiny extent.

Obviously those many voters stand to lose something by ending the graft, and therefore of course no politician will touch the idea of inhibiting it, for fear of alienating those votes.

But in the real universe in which we are supposed to be living, most beneficiaries recognize a free ride and while they regret its ending they actually feel a bit relieved.