Last July I mused that California’s budget problems were going to collide with several of California’s other problems and leave state Republicans stuck choosing between “no new taxes” and “tough on crime.” The intellectual inconsistency has been there for a while, but now the rubber has hit the road in Contra Costa County, where there’s no money for prosecuting crimes:

Misdemeanors such as assaults, thefts and burglaries will no longer be prosecuted in Contra Costa County because of budget cuts, the county’s top prosecutor said Tuesday.

District Attorney Robert Kochly also said that beginning May 4, his office will no longer prosecute felony drug cases involving smaller amounts of narcotics. That means anyone caught with less than a gram of methamphetamine or cocaine, less than 0.5 grams of heroin and fewer than five pills of ecstasy, OxyContin or Vicodin won’t be charged.

People who are suspected of misdemeanor drug crimes, break minor traffic laws, shoplift, trespass or commit misdemeanor vandalism will also be in the clear. Those crimes won’t be prosecuted, either.

Now, effectively decriminalizing small-scale drug possession is interesting, and the merits of this accidental pilot program can certainly be discussed. But as it turns out, there seems to actually be a bottom to a strategy of just cutting and cutting as a budget ‘solution’. DA Robert Kochly told the Chron:

“Unfortunately, we have now reached a point where we cannot maintain the status quo…[w]e will definitely be doing ‘less with less’ as a prosecution agency.”

The changes are needed to help eliminate a $1.9 million budget deficit in the district attorney’s office for this fiscal year. By month’s end, six deputy district attorneys will be laid off, and 11 more will have to be let go by the end of the year, Kochly said.

“Less with less” kinda sums up the entire GOP budget position doesn’t it? These are the specific consequences of refusing to do anything but cut budgets. Eventually, government can simply no longer function. It’s Grover Norquist’s wet dream, but it isn’t actually any way to live. This is why 2/3 needs to be majority, it’s why the May 19 props are ridiculous, it’s why the California GOP is falling apart, and it’s why business needs to be done in a fundamentally different way as soon as possible in Sacramento.

Cause these are the consequences of the way we’ve been doing things, and this is just a beginning. Less with less ad infinitum just doesn’t work.