I’ve just gotten a slew of emails from my neighbors telling me that if Arnold Schwarzenegger gets what he wants, one in five of California’s public parks will be shut down, and Topanga State Park is among those on the list.
We in Topanga are not happy about this.
Oh, yes, and hundreds of dollars per student will also be cut from California’s already troubled educational system. (The SF Chron outlines some of the unpleasant details of the education cuts below.)
Cut $400 million in the current year and reduce the state’s share of K-12 funding by $4.4 billion, or about 10 percent, in the 2008-09 budget year.The proposal includes cutting $2.6 billion from school and county apportionments and $1.1 billion from class-size reduction programs, charter school grants and home-to-school transportation programs. About $360 million also would come from special education programs, while $199 million would come from child development.
Schwarzenegger’s proposed cuts were announced on Thursday and, although the state is indeed in a fiscal crisis (again), Arnold’s solution is a foolishly conceived 10-percent across-the-board cut rather than slashing the programs that are more fat-filled and less worthy and raising (gasp) taxes.
(To be fair, Arnold has not gotten much budgetary help from the state’s pathologically partisan legislature.)
In addition, Schwarzenegger wants to release 22,000 prisoners as part of his numbers-crunching mania, a move that has state conservatives in a state of apoplexy but is actually quite practical. The prisoners who would be released are low level, non-violent offenders with less than 20 months left on their sentences. Not a big deal and no kind of monster threat to public safety. Plus it might actually help to ease a bit of the prison’s catastrophic overcrowding problem.
But ten percent cuts in such areas as parks, education and health care for the poor are straight irresponsible.
“Just this week,” said California School’s Chief, Jack O’Connell, “Education Week’s comprehensive report card of public school systems nationwide gave California a grade of D+ when it comes to funding our schools. It reported that California spends $1,892 per pupil less than the national average.”
Oh by the way, the San Francisco Chron notes that state officials have announced that money will be spent to hire patrols to make sure California residents are kept out of the closed parks.
Lovely.
Think of California as a household that went on a buying spree and now has all of these monthly payments. You have to make cuts somewhere. The luxuries go first and recent purchases need to be returned. Also, you have to let family leeches know that you can’t continue to support them–so cut off benefits to illegals.
Think of California as a state that decided not to raise any revenues. I think Bill bradley over at New West Notes is right and that this is the opening gambit to see if the governator can get some new taxes. As bill told Warren Olney last night the GOP types absolutely refuse to name any programs that they will cut. Their hero, Reagan, raised money but they are stuck in fantasyland.
Parks, schools, prisons, are not considered “Luxuries” by the people of this state. And the parks chosen are in places like Malibu and Pacific Palisades. There some method to all this. Let us see how long they hold out.
The problem with liberals is that they consider nothing a luxury unless it has to do with the military, and they believe that taxes can be increased infinitely.
Why don’t you roll back the clock, cut all programs put in place since the last balanced budget, reconsider them one-by-one, and approve only those worthy and affordable by cutting other fat to pay for them. Better yet, cut back the tax rate to what it was in 1960 and then re-authorize all programs systematically as necessity requires and as money allows.
The problem isn’t that the state won’t increase taxes. That’s been done over and over. The problem is that it won’t work within the tax increases previously approved. It sure sounds like a state of Democrats to me.
I suspect there’s something else going on here too, Richard.
There’s propositions 94 thru 97 on the ballot in a few weeks, for instance.
The problem with liberals is that they consider nothing a luxury unless it has to do with the military, and they believe that taxes can be increased infinitely.
LOL!
Thanks for the comic relief, Woody!
I just read that O.J. Simpson is going back to jail. Maybe he and Michael Vick should get together. Anyway, I’d rather have him in jail than a new teeter-totter in Topanga State Park.
One other idea on balancing the budget…the state owns enough excess land which could pay off the debt and fund programs for years if it just sold that land to developers. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for someone who won’t pay his obligations and also refuses to sell his excess property that could cover them.
If you owe the IRS or the state tax money and cannot pay, but you have a lot of equity in your home, you can bet that the government would look to you to satisfy the debt by getting a new mortgage or selling the property. That should work in reverse, too.
Here’s the funny thing. Woody lives in a low tax low service state that, nevertheless, is a prime federal welfare recipient. The South – being our most backward rgion – has always depended on the taxes of the other parts of the country to keep it going. Consider all the water projects from the Army Corps of Engineers. Then there is the money for crops – mainly cotton – and the Agricultural Stations. Where do you think Carver got the dough to do his peanut experiments? But right at the top of the list have been military bases. Congressmen and Senators from the Old Confederacy excelled in getting Naval Depots, Army Forts and Air Force Bases in their region. Up north you have Fort Drum. Years ago Devens in MA closed. But look at Georgia:
Ft Benning, a naval air station, some AFBS.
And, lest we forget Lockheed Georgia and other metal benders.
California is a net contributor to places like Georgia and Mississippi and Alabama and don’t you forget it.
Meanwhile, here when we had Governors like Brown the elder and Warren we taxed ourselves and built schools, universities, highways, aqueducts, and parks, and the people came. At one time California got 50% of the Defense R&D dollars as well as a hefty procurement slice. Why? Cause we turned out the Ph.D scientists and the graduate engineers from our low cost (hell absurdly low cost) public universities and the technicians from our free community colleges.
The Congress could put the bases in dixie but thye had to send the money to buy the stuff that went on those bases to places that had the brainpower to design and produce them.
Silicon Valley is another story and look where it is located.
(HINT: go south from San Francisco on Highway 101 or Interstate 580)
Moral of the above: you get what you pay for and Californians have to decide if they want to continue to live in the Golden State or in Alabama.
Its that simple.
Woody, even I’m pretty fed up with your pontificating to us in California about things you know nothing about. Coming from a state like Georgia, which blames its water shortage on liberals and don’t get me started about what I really think, from having done business there and visiting numerous times.
A friend who’s pretty conservative by L A standards had to relocate there and is going nuts on numerous levels.
As for your opining abuot teeter-totters at Topanga: this part is a natural wilderness type place with waterfalls, one of the few left in the city — popular for hiking, school, boy scout and Sierra Club groups, as well as private ciitzens of all persuasions. They even let in radical conservatives from Georgia.
But it’s because it’s such a terrific park, one of the few left that’s not an overcrowded extension of the urban blight that has affected many city parks, that this and the beach parks (also, of course, the least densely visited and it’s a good thing for their ecology) are the first scheduled to close. The “reason” behind choosing them is simple: they’re picking the parks with fewest annual visitors. Precisely the ones that give people a much-needed near-city escape.
I’d be fine with charging a couple of bucks admission or an annual pass of some $50 bucks for regular visitors/joggers, like the National Parks have to, if that means keeping them open.
Above I meant of course, “this park” not “this part.” Only think I agree with Woody about is the local pols have to stop treating L A as a “sanctuary city” and drop SP 40, which encourages illegals to settle here and drains our coffers.
Yesterday the Daily News quoted a report that illegals cost us $444 million/year in social services NOT counting the schools (where all the growth comes from immigrants, while there’s a net exodus of others, including blacks and Hispanics moving to outlying areas where housing is cheaper and schools are better — places like much of Georgia).
However ric is right that if despite this disproportionate drain — which is fundamentally caused by lack of immigration policy from the feds, because once illegals are IN the country, it’s just a matter of WHERE they’ll settle and place their burdens, ultimately, it’s a fed obligation — we are a net contributor to the country, incl. Georgia. We raise the vast majority of year-round crops, have the best state-funded university system in the country despite all these other burdens, and yes, are struggling to maintain these parks and open areas which were created by people who understand their value to quality of life. We’re now having to fend off state Republicans from hickish towns where there is nothing but open space, who know little more than you do about American’s second-biggest city.
rlc, it’s fine with me if you want to cut welfare payments to the poor in Georgia–most of whom are black. Most of that money is being spent or wasted because of the welfare programs of Democrats and the Great Society, which made people dependent rather than helped them.
BTW, I have to laugh at your claim about money being spent on a Naval Air Station in Atlanta. Have you seen that big facility? I literally can throw a rock from one to the other of it.
On waterways, remember it was Democrat FDR that started TVA and government takeover of waterways and energy in the South. Government has no business being in competition with Alabama Power. Now, Alabama does have 77,000 miles of rivers and streams and the most navigable rivers of any state, and 1/12 of water that flows into the oceans from the lower 48 states goes through Alabama, so it’s not surprising that the Army Corp of Engineers would be heavily involved there. Of course, you just hate it because they are the Army.
BTW, California should quit stealing water from the Colorado River since you guys are so self sufficient.
WBC, have your friend call me. After meeting me, he will think that the rest of Georgians are pretty liberal.
You’re conservative for Georgia? I thought you said once that Georgians thought you were too liberal?
One thing that bugs me the most is that they’re always trying to get me to go to their local, evangelical “born again” churches, even affluent people. Here in the blue states we tend to associate that kind of thinking with the less educated. Explains why Huckabee would be real popular there.
Given the barely latent racism down South, do you really think Obama has a chance other than with blacks and very liberal whites?
RLC, Several people are suggesting what BB has said about this being a ploy on Arnold’s part. I frankly think so too. It’s likely not a bad move.
WBC, I was too tired last night to say all that about Topanga State Park. Thanks for saying it so well. I happen to live nearby, but it and Malibu State Park are remarkable places. By the way, it does cost money to get in, at least if you want to park, or you can get a yearly pass. I think people would gladly pay a bit more to keep it open. I also think if when one bought one’s yearly pass if one was given the option of paying a little extra toward the cost of school kids coming up to the park (several inner city schools that I know of do bring their kids yearly), many people would do so gladly. That fact that these places exist and are accessible to everyone is important to the mental and emotional health of a city/state/country.
The L A Times editorial against this dullwitted plan notes that there are at least a couple dozen ways to get into Topanga illegally, circumventing the front gate, and people will continue to do it, but then won’t be supervised and it might become dangerous.
As for Will Rogers Park, there’s a provision in his will that if it’s no longer open to the public, it reverts back to the family trust. I heard there’s a group trying to raise money to run it privately. Sounds like this IS what Arnold was counting on: close the parks in the “rich” areas, and people will raise private funds and/or agree to higher entry fees or taxes. Like they already do elsewhere.
The average state collects TAXES of $2,291 from each person in the state.
California collets 34% more than the average state in taxes or $3,082 per person.
Collected per person (includes sales, property, income, corp, etc) Calulated by (Total Taxes 2006 / Total Population 2005)
Alabama 1,871
Alaska 3,744
Arizona 1,972
Arkansas 2,504
California 3,082
Colorado 1,827
Connecticut 3,456
Delaware 3,391
Florida 2,091
Georgia 1,877
Hawaii 3,857
Idaho 2,199
Illinois 2,204
Indiana 2,172
Iowa 2,063
Kansas 2,286
Kentucky 2,385
Louisiana 2,134
Maine 2,717
Maryland 2,598
Massachusetts 3,031
Michigan 2,343
Minnesota 3,377
Mississippi 2,050
Missouri 1,755
Montana 2,273
Nebraska 2,252
Nevada 2,548
New Hampshire 1,588
New Jersey 2,850
New Mexico 2,650
New York 2,833
North Carolina 2,373
North Dakota 2,547
Ohio 2,149
Oklahoma 2,194
Oregon 2,085
Pennsylvania 2,337
Rhode Island 2,548
South Carolina 1,824
South Dakota 1,523
Tennessee 1,786
Texas 1,601
Utah 2,211
Vermont 3,863
Virginia 2,272
Washington 2,610
West Virginia 2,509
Wisconsin 2,492
Wyoming 4,167
rlc, for Georgia, I’m conservative on some issues and liberal on others. I was just making a wise crack above. I follow my own path rather than see where everyone else runs. I believe in government limiting its role to the minimum but I try to be sympathetic and generous to people who hurt–but, with my own money.
I’m sorry that you don’t like people concerned about your life in enternity. I guess if your house was on fire, you wouldn’t want anyone trying to save you. For Christians to be so stupid, I know a lot of very educated and successful people who fit that description.
Regarding racism and Obama’s chances, the worst racism that I’ve ever seen was by a Yankee in a blue state, and it was extreme to anything that I personally heard or witnessed in the South. The problem that Obama would face in the South isn’t so much his race but his liberal views, and maybe his ears.
Celeste and rlc, regarding the California parks and the budget, something has to give, and higher taxes and fees shouldn’t be one of the options. You show that you have your own golden calves and you think that sacrifices need to be made as long as those sacrificies don’t come from you. No wonder the problem gets worse.
If Topanga park is so good for the mental health of people, someone needs to drive to the inner city and take the poor people on field trips. Actually, and I’m just guessing, wouldn’t you consider that park a playground and refuge for the “elite” rather than the dredges of society?
Woody I was referring to the “Welfare” that takes money from California and ships it to Georgia and Alabama et al in the form of military bases, water projects, cotton price supports and the like. Last time I looked a lot of very pale skinned people benefitted from that. And would it surprise you to learn that more whites than blacks are on welfare in the region? Also higher rates of personal bankruptcy, divorce, out-of-wedlock births and so many other neat examples of rugged individualism!
rlc, if you don’t want Ft. Benning training our army and don’t want Maxwell AFB and Pensacola NAS training pilots and you don’t want our submarines to have a base at Kings Bay and you don’t want Marshall and Kennedy space centers to help us exlore our world and universe, and if you do want to pay more for cotton that goes into your clothes and fabrics for many uses, and if you want fewer dams generating hydroelectric power because you like coal burning generators better and think that transporting coal on rails makes more sense than with barges, then just write your congressman telling him that you want to cut off all this money going to southern states for those purposes. That should work if your congressman is as stupid as you. Good luck.
On welfare, the north has itself to blame for poverty of both blacks and whites in the South starting with reconstruction. It’s the only time in the history of our country where the people who were conquered were punished for decades rather than helped to rebuild. I’m sure you would see no problem with the way that Sherman destroyed the homes and work of private citizens and are okay with the way the government left them.
In earlier times, the culture, sophistication, and education of people in Charleston and other southern cities was far superior to the trashiness of northern cities. I still consider that true today for those of us who don’t expect government to be our nanny and really are rugged individualists.
Then, your undocumented statistics about welfare ignores meaningful percentages of whites and blacks using or abusing the programs. LBJ didn’t start the war on poverty (it’s really going well) to help poor whites, and the whites didn’t expect it. The programs are payoffs to blacks to live on the Democratic plantation, and they use the programs in much greater proportions.
If you don’t like welfare going to blacks in the South, maybe you need to recognize that from 55-90% of all black Americans have lived in the South over the decades of the past century. We can cut down on the government benefits sent here for them by your accepting most into California’s utopia. We can start with the lady behind me who has a PhD but painted her house an awful color.
Your generalizations and conclusions are typical liberal and completely illogical.
Looking at the financial problems of California, it’s apparent that you people clearly know how to spend money. In Georiga, we’re looking at reducing taxes and eliminating the state property taxes. Too bad for you–but, don’t move here.
Next protest sign: “People – Not Parks”
and if you do want to pay more for cotton that goes into your clothes and fabrics for many uses,
Actually, we pay more for cotton because of the price subsidies to cotton farmers. If there were no subsidies, cheaper cotton from Brazil, Mali, Burkina Faso and Chad could compete fairly in an open market. That’s basic capitalism.
The US has lost this battle time and again in the WTO and we are about to have our heads handed to us on this issue.
As for the Marshall Space Flight Center, as you know, Redstone Arsenal owes its continued existence to John Sparkman a Democrat.
I’ve been to Ft. Benning, Columbus and Phenix City in August. If I were to give the world an enema, I think I’d stick the nozzle somewhere in the Chattahoochee dead center between the two towns – in August.
BTW, I’ll consider Alabama serious about fair taxation the day they eliminate sales tax on groceries and non-prescription medicine. I’m sure you’ll agree with that.
Only Randy would think about giving the world an enema.
Way to not address the substance of what I said.
Only Randy would think about giving the world an enema.
Just for the record, you’re wrong again.
I’ve watched minor league baseball games on the banks of the Chattahoochee where Columbus borders Phenix City. There’s a nice river walk there and a lot of family fun at the ballpark, including the “Flying Elvises” promotion. If your substance is that that area represents the anus of the Earth, then my observations contradict that.
Why do you want to give the Earth an enema? Who else has thought about that?
Well it was God awful when I was there in the 1970’s.
Maybe it got better because you left.
I never lived there. I worked for a company called John Bransby Productions that made films for the US Army. It used to be based on Redstone Arsenal. We had an assignment at Ft. Benning. I spent a month there one week.
Why do you want to give the Earth an enema? Who else has thought about that?
Click the link on “you’re wrong again.” The phrase did not originate with me. Google turned up 1,580 hits using the phrase.
I didn’t even realize that you had posted a link above. Wow, your found 1,580 hits on google for giving the Earth an enema! Guess what. There are over one-half million hits for “stupid liberals.”
Somehow, we have drifted off topic.
I didn’t even realize that you had posted a link above
How about a thread on how wingnuts with poor visual comprehension?
Randy, I don’t know how your monitor display is configured, but your text containing a link looks exactly like normal text on my computer, and I could only detect its location by running my cursor over the words. Fortunately, you rarely have anything worth sharing, so it usually doesn’t matter.
Fortunately, you rarely have anything worth sharing, so it usually doesn’t matter.
My only response (click on the word response).