Posted by
TheChair on Thursday, December 18, 2008 9:05:21 AM
The final tally came in last Saturday... Prop. 8 won by 599,602 votes, a 52.3 to 47.7 spread. It prevailed in 43 of 58 counties.
We're in a holding pattern concerning the legal briefs. There was an initial flurry of filings, resulting in the California Supreme Court deciding to hear the Prop. 8 challenges on review. Now we wait for those substantive briefs on review.
Meanwhile, California's state budget has gone into the crapper. I see no reasonable hope of it being fixed any time soon. Right now the deficit is at least $18 billion and in two years' time it will be over $42 billion.
Here's how the majority democrat state legislature intends to deal with it:
Democrats would justify implementing the taxes with a simple majority by calling some of the revenues "fees" that pay for particular programs. Such fees can be put into effect without GOP support. They are also planning to take money from existing fee accounts, use it to balance the budget and then replenish the accounts with higher fees.
They're going to fix things by calling taxes "fees," and by stealing from current fee accounts while leaving worthless IOU's in them... with circus music playing on the calliope. I have news for you. If you think those accounts aren't already empty, you're stupid. And the fee increases won't hold up in court. In California, 2/3 of the legislature must sign off on tax increases, and calling them something else isn't a winning legal argument.
County Sheriff's are routinely releasing early crooks simply because of budget trouble. Federal judges are about to order a population cap on state prisons... because of the inadequate and underfunded prison medical care. The state legislature is about to hike taxes in the midst of a major recession. And the budget bomb is starting to explode. We won't feel all the shrapnel until next spring and summer, but we feel some now. It's going to get real ugly.