If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullsh*t.  Our lovely Governator is proposing an immediate “temporary” one cent hike in one of the most regressive taxes known to man, the sales tax.   And this is right after demanding that state workers earn the federal minimum wage of $6.55 an hour in a state where the cost of gas is still well over $4 a gallon and Los Angeles is intent on removing the dollar value menu from poor neighborhoods.   Because no food at all is better than Latinos being fat, isn’t it?

Why are poor people and those who the governor intends to make poor, expected to bail out the economy of a state that has so many millionaires?  Why can’t the rich pay a little more in taxes on the exorbitant amounts of money that they spend on vacations, expensive cars they don’t know how to drive and eating at restaurants featuring edibles that aren’t really food?  Why are the people at the bottom of the economic ladder expected to bear the brunt of the state’s fiscal mismanagement and political grandstanding by having their benefits cut to the bone and then adding insult to injury by taking what little money they have go to support prisons and corporations instead of being funneled back into programs to help them make everyone’s lives better?  Things like real education for children, public transportation and rebuilding the infrastructure.

Democrats have been open about their desire for higher taxes to help solve the deficit, though the sales tax is by no means their first choice. The Democratic budget proposal includes $9 billion in new taxes, but they are aimed mostly at corporations and the wealthy. Sales tax increases, by contrast, tend to hit lower- and middle-income residents harder because they spend a bigger share of their income on taxable sales.

One political analyst said the governor should explain his tax plan to the public, rather than having it leak to the media.

“This is Mr. Salesman, the guy who could sell anything,” said Tony Quinn, co-editor of the California Target Book which analyzes legislative races. “If he’s going to sell his party on a sales tax, and the Democrats who view it as regressive, he ought to lay it out before the people.”

Nope that’s called honesty with a dash of cojones and it isn’t something that politicians are known for.   Requiring a two thirds majority to pass a state budget when all the Republicans are interested in are playing games with people’s lives and pretending that they have the people’s best interests at heart has not worked for the people of California for many years.  Every July we go through the same thing and meanwhile the state is falling down around our ears.

Eventually, like when the state isn’t considered a player in the world economy and only the movie stars have money to spend on purchases that aren’t required for daily survival, things are going to have to change.  Unfortunately, it’s going to be too late for the majority of Californians.  They will have already moved to Mexico in order to have a better quality of life.

One of the newer entries into the California right-wing blogosphere is Fox and Hounds Daily, a project of the Small Business Action Committee and its head, Joel Fox. Fox was the longtime head of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, which helps explain Fox’s absurd anti-tax screed about various local taxes on the LA ballot.

Whenever right-wingers start expressing concern about how taxes will impact working people, those working Californians should immediately be skeptical. Since when have conservatives expressed genuine concern for the needs of the poor, or the shrinking middle class? Conservatives have long used taxes to attain populist credibility with working Californians but a close examination of Fox’s article shows that this is based on a lie. The right-wing anti-tax movement is directly responsible for the dire straits working Californians find themselves in today, and the proposals Fox criticizes would do much to help save them money.

This is the core point that Democrats and progressives need to be repeatedly hitting – taxes save you money. Take for example the proposed LA Metro sales tax that Fox uses as a prime target:

The MTA wants a ½-cent sales tax hike for thirty years to cover various transportation projects. When implemented (if passed), L.A.’s sales tax will be 8.75%. That assumes there will be no state sales tax increase that may come along in a state budget deal. If that happens, along with a successful MTA sales tax increase, Los Angeles residents will be looking at a sales tax over 9%.

Nowhere in the article does Fox mention what the tax would be used for. It’s a typical disinformation move – complain about higher taxes but fail to explain what it would provide. As gas prices soared, working Californians’ wallets were squeezed, perhaps nowhere moreso than in Los Angeles County, which has a growing mass transit system but remains overly reliant on automobiles for commuting.

The LACMTA proposal would address that by providing billions for desperately needed mass transit projects, whether it’s the Subway to the Sea, the Foothill Extension of the Gold Line, or some other project. Mass transit saves people money. Real money. That’s why ridership on the LACMTA’s rail lines soared this year. Southern Californians are desperate for mass transit options so that they can save money. Why does Fox want to deny them that option?

More over the flip…

Small businesses have an especially strong interest in mass transit. Many of their workers have been priced out of the LA city center and have to move to the suburbs. Rising gas prices hit them hard, and that makes it difficult for LA small businesses to retain workers. Of course, when people pay more at the pump, their retail spending drops. Big chains can weather that decline far better than small and medium businesses can.

Of course, Fox is merely advancing an ideological agenda under the cover of defending small business. Otherwise why would he oppose Antonio Villaraigosa’s plan to hire more cops? Small businesses can’t afford to hire their own security the way the big chains can. And small businesses need good schools to provide the trained workers that they need to survive.

It’s not just small businesses that ought to reject Fox’s concern trolling. Working Californians have seen widening inequality over the last 30 years – which just so happens to be the same length of time that anti-tax politics that have dominated our state. They’re suffering largely because they don’t have the same public services that produced the prosperous middle class in the 1950s and 1960s. Tax cuts have meant higher college fees, higher transportation costs, and higher health care costs for fewer services.

The legacy of tax cuts in California is a destructive one. But until Democrats and progressives start explaining that tax cuts actually cost more to small business and working Californians than higher taxes, conservative faux-populism will continue to dominate our state. Fox is overt about his strategy:

But turnout is unlikely to counterbalance the piling on effect taxpayers will feel from all these tax measures. Constant talk of tax increases will blur the different measures in taxpayers’ minds and some, if not all of the measures, could face a voter backlash.

The response, then, is to constantly talk about the savings that these public services will provide – and the costs of not approving these taxes. How much money will Southern Californians have to shell out at the pump over the next ten years without the LACMTA sales tax?

If we are to defeat folks like Fox, we need to provide the answers to those kind of questions.

Conservative Dan Walters says your stunt of slashing state employee has failed. That’s when you know the CW has well and truly turned on you, especially for a faux moderate like Arnold. And that’s just what happened to Arnold Schwarzenegger in today’s Bee.

In an article entitled, “Governor’s latest political stunt is a dud,” the big font of political wisdom that is Dan Walters proceeds to say what we’ve been saying here the whole time: Arnold is a cheap 3-ring circus master. In fact, we said that many times back in 2006, but that was just an election. Who cares if Arnold chooses to ignore the fiscal realities and to attack Phil for proposing tax increases to fix the deficit? Right, that’s just an election.

But, for Walters, this is as close as you get to really laying into our faux moderate Governor:

Arnold Schwarzenegger, it would appear, just can’t help himself. The man who achieved success as a bodybuilder and action movie star with over-the-top, attention-getting stunts keeps trying to make them work in politics – and keeps failing.

The governor’s latest political stunt is a grandiose order … Other than creating much angst among innocent state workers, however, Schwarzenegger’s stunt appears to be having little impact. It has not altered the conflict over whether taxes should be raised or spending cut to close a deficit. The administration is undercutting itself by exempting thousands of workers from its provisions and issuing conflicting decrees on its effects. And state Controller John Chiang says he can’t do it. (SacBee 8/5/08)

Combine this with the growing pundit consensus on the 2/3 rule and you have, well, what we’ve pretty much been saying here for the past several years.  Thanks for reading, Dan.

I really don’t know where this came from other than the shrinking class of California political pundits just understanding common sense, but they are all gradually coming on board with the notion that what’s killing the state is the 2/3 requirement, and that until it’s fixed, nothing in the Capitol will materially change.

Most of George Skelton’s column today concerns the “dance of death” – a ritual slaughtering of budget proposals through the normal legislative process until one survivor comes out on top.  There is too much of a top-down approach in the legislature, with the Big 5 making the determination on the budget instead of the relevant committees having a crack at it.  But near the end, Skelton reveals the truth:

My nomination for additional budget reform: Eliminate the ludicrous requirement of a two-thirds legislative vote for passage of a budget. Only two other states suffer the same straitjacket. California would have had a budget weeks ago if it could have been passed by a simple majority vote. The governor still would have the final say with his paring knife.

This mirrors exactly what conservative Dan Walters said in his column the day before.  Walters wants to keep the requirement for tax votes, but he does seem to understand that without the accountability that a majority budget vote provides, there’s no way to peg the fortunes or failures of the state on any one political party.  Not only does it hinder legislators from doing their jobs, it impedes the opportunity for voters to determine the cause and effect.  It’s the “killer app” for governmental reform, and must be the first, last and only step in the short term to end the perpetual crisis at the heart of a broken system.

Now, this reform will not come easy.  Republicans will caterwaul at losing the only leverage they currently own.  The only path to this solution comes with actually getting a 2/3 majority in both chambers, and then offering the solution up for a vote in time for the next governor to reap the rewards.  The Drive for 2/3 is monumentally important (and it’s likely to be a two-cycle process) to restore functionality to Sacramento and allow legislators to do the work their constituents sent them to the Capitol to do.

A few months late and several billion dollars short, Arnold has finally gotten around to making a serious revenue proposal – a 1 cent increase in the sales tax for a duration of three years. The SacBee reports this is expected to raise around $4 to $5 billion.

Not one to offer a solution without strings, Arnold insists that this would only happen in exchange for “long-term budget fixes” such as a rainy-day fund. A rainy day fund is a good idea but that needs to come AFTER we fix the structural  revenue shortfall.

The problem with Arnold’s proposal is that as most people recognize, sales taxes are a very regressive form of taxation. The Democrats’ tax plan would have relied on income and corporate taxes and would have generated nearly $10 billion in revenue, greatly easing the current crisis.

Instead Arnold, in typical fashion, thinks the poor and working Californians should suffer for the budget to be fixed. A smaller sales tax increase might not be a bad idea, but income and corporate taxes are the better solution, as those kind of tax increases promote more economic growth and provide more stability for state revenues. Another solution would be sales tax modernization, where goods and services currently exempt would be included to reflect a 21st century economy. That would provide more stable revenues while also spreading the burden out more fairly.

Democrats are in a stronger position than they realize on this. The public wants smart, effective solutions on the budget, and they want their services to be protected. Let’s hope they stick to those values.

PS: John Chiang tears yet another hole in Arnold’s ridiculous wage and jobs cut: the state does NOT actually face a cash crisis, Chiang told a Senate committee. Chiang is emerging as a hero on this, and Arnold’s attack on the workers is being revealed for the shock doctrine-style assault on wages and jobs that many of us always suspected it to be.

[UPDATE] by Robert The LA Times has more details:

The increase of one cent per dollar would take effect soon after a budget is signed and last three to four years; after that, the tax rate would gradually drop. It would ultimately settle at a level lower than the current statewide rate of 7.25%.

That last part is troubling. I’d love to see a more progressive tax structure in California, and more reliance on income, corporate, and property taxes as opposed to the sales tax. But to turn this into yet another tax cut, outside of an overall and comprehensive revenue solution, is only going to make matters worse.

The Times also has more on the budget reforms Arnold is demanding:

The proposal, floated in meetings with the Legislature’s leaders and their staff, hinges on lawmakers agreeing to automatic spending restraints and new powers for governors to cut programs whenever the state falls into the red.

I wonder if those new powers would even be constitutional. In any case they’re very unwise. Separation of powers seems unfashionable these days, but it matters. The Legislature, as the most direct representatives of the people, must never cede this power to the executive branch. A line-item veto is bad enough. No governor should have unilateral power to make cuts.

Ultimately all of this shows that Arnold isn’t really interested in budget solutions, but instead wants to use the crisis to ram through far-right solutions that would otherwise never be accepted. Arnold is a textbook example of the shock doctrine that Naomi Klein so ably described in her recent book. Perhaps every Democrat in the Capitol needs a copy?