Matthews Unplugged -- Again

Chris Matthews calls Sarah Palin a Fascist:

What can anyone possibly say to this?

Forbes: The High Cost Of The U.S. Budget

Forbes writers Eric Singer and David Malpass:

Early last week the administration unveiled its new $3.8 trillion budget. This budget, and the spending it assumes, is so reckless it is difficult to fathom. It projects a deficit of $1.6 trillion for fiscal 2010, with an explosion of publicly traded government debt to $18.5 trillion by 2020. Debt service is projected to reach $912 billion a year by 2020, or over $5,000 for every working person in America.

Even assuming that wages grow over time, the budget suggests the government believes that as U.S. citizens we should devote 10% or more of our grossincome just to pay the interest on the federal debt. That 10% comes out of income even before people start paying for actual government programs like national defense, health care, bank rescues and welfare. Nor does it count the spending people need to make for state and local government obligations and their own mortgage and credit card payments.

The administration clearly believes that we can spend our way out of a slow economy and has put us on a path to have total government spending over 40% of GDP. This is Disneyland thinking. While it is true that we can spend our way into a depression, there is little evidence we can spend our way out. It didn't work last year, when we allocated $ 787 billion in stimulus spending on the threat that unemployment would go over 8% otherwise. (It is now at 9.7%--16.5% if you count the underemployed and those who are too discouraged to look for work.) Excess spending didn't work for President George W. Bush. It didn't work for Presidents Roosevelt or Obama.

read the rest of the story http://www.forbes.com/2010/02/08/debt-budget-government-obama-opinions-contributors-malpass-singer.html?boxes=Homepagechannels 

Acorn Leader In Trouble Again

Andrew Breitbart's Big Government reports Under Investigation, ACORN Chief Bertha Lewis Quits Working Families Party

Bertha Lewis Departs From WFP, Perjury Charges Possible In Staten Island Case

With national scrutiny on ACORN and local scrutiny on the Working Families Party, ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis quietly departed as state co-chair of the Working Families Party.

Lewis was a founding co-chair of the Party. According to Working Families spokesman Dan Levitan, Lewis stopped serving as co-chair “about a year ago,” though many people familiar with the Party were unaware of that change and Lewis was identified as a current co-chair in an interview on WNYC’s The Brian Lehrer Showas recently as September.

The change in leadership comes as the Working Families Party and many of its endorsed candidates are providing extensive email and other documentation in response to December subpoenas from the United States Attorney’s office in New York. Lawyers are also preparing to return to Staten Island Supreme Court on Feb. 23 for the lawsuit being brought against the WFP’s company, Data & Field Services, and the campaign of now-Council Member Debi Rose by Randy Mastro on behalf of five Republican-connected residents of her Staten Island district.

The lawsuit, however, may not be the only legal action on the horizon. The trial was stopped short in January by Judge Anthony Giacobbe after Rose’s treasurer, David Thomas testified that he had neither written nor was familiar with the information provided in affidavits to the Campaign Finance Board. That may result in attention from Staten Island District Attorney Dan Donovan—“there’s a very strong possibility of a perjury case here,” according to local legal sources.

Lest we forget, the New York Times reported in December:

Federal prosecutors have subpoenaed documents from the New York City-based Working Families Party, which has been criticized in recent months over its campaign financing activities.

People close to the party who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk on the matter said that they did not know the scope of the subpoena, but said they were taking the investigation very seriously.

More background here.

And, of course, here, where the whole thing started.

Interview With Steve Poizner

By KATY GRIMES

Whose company developed the GPS trackers for cell phones, taught American Government to 12^th graders, is one of the creators of the Charter Schools movement in California, worked in the White House Fellowship Program during 9/11, defeated Cruz Bustamante in an election, and is excited about running for governor during an economic meltdown?

Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner knows there is an “economic meltdown” (his words) in this state, and thinks that it’s the best time to bring about big changes and reform state government.

Recently I sat down with Poizner to talk about his run for governor.  A self-described “in-the-trenches” kind of guy, Poizner wanted to get right to the issues when I asked how he was managing a campaign and still working as insurance commissioner. Poizner said he has 25 full-time campaign employees who he says are crucial to maintaining balance.

Since water is on everyone’s radar screen in California, I asked Poizner what he would change about the recent water bills’ inequitable provisions requiring that Sacramento and Central Valley cities reduce water usage 20 percent by 2020, while coastal cities need only reduce usage by 10 percent. Poizner said he was not specifically aware of the issue, but would research it. ”I strongly support above-ground water storage and updating California’s infrastructure,” he said. “I oppose the blatant pork-filled water bill package.”

On education, Poizner said he and his 18-year old daughter are busy filling out applications for college right now. A few years ago he spent a year teaching 12th-grade American Government in order to get  experience in the classroom, as well as understand the myriad issues surrounding education in the state. Poizner described teaching in a poor school district “was made even more challenging by the school’s  leaky roof and bad lighting, conditions that students and teachers live with every day.”

Poizner was vehement when he said he “wants to yank control of schools from the state and give it back to local districts” (Poizner is co-founder of the Charter Schools Association, the largest charter association in the country). He said that during the last 30 to 40 years, the Legislature has taken control over California schools, trying to run all 5,000 California schools under the state education code. Poizner wants parents to have school choice through offerings of charter schools, home schooling, public and private schools as well as move school decisions to local districts.

Poizner believes that since the Department of Education is, he said, “the largest of the state’s bureaucracies, it also eats up the most state cash with 5,000 schools, 1,000 school districts, 58 county boards of education and 2,000 pages of education code.” Poizner added that he wants to “flatten the thing,” referring to the need for dramatic reform to the department.

When asked about the need for public pension reform, Poizner launched into a financial explanation of pension anomalies in the state. “Pensions need to be funded, and California’s public pensions are not,” he said. “The unfunded liability Californians will be exposed to in the future is a debt that will be paid by our children’s grandkids. Pushing the debt down the road, and down to a few more generations cannot continue.” Instead, he wants to see the state move toward a defined contribution structure, in which the level of contributions are fixed and most of the contributions come from employees, instead of being paid by taxpayers.

Asked what sets him apart from the other Republican candidate for governor Meg Whitman, Poizner pointed out that she has Democratic strategists in her camp, as well as moderate political views. Poizner reiterated his conservative values, and insisted that he does not deviate from these regardless of the group he is addressing.  ”I use ‘conservative’ in every speech I give,” he said.

Poizner is originally from Texas, a state that is actively luring California businesses away with lower tax rates and fewer business regulations. “California needs to reduce the tax structure to be competitive,” he said. Poizner explained that Silicon Valley “transformed the world” but now California is out of sync.” Yet Poizner acknowledged that “California still has an advantage because people want to be here for our climate and life style, unlike so many other states.”

Poizner has lived in California for 30 years, ironically moving here during when current gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown was governor. Poizner points to Brown as responsible for the start of the demise of the Golden State, and relishes chances to contrast their differing ideology. When I asked him why state employees need labor union representation, Poizner said simply, ”Ask Jerry Brown. Jerry Brown is the governor who signed the law enacting the state employee’s labor union 30 years ago.”

Poizner supports enacting the paycheck protection act, prohibiting public employee unions from deducting political contributions from employee paychecks.

“California needs tort reform, and labor laws to be in sync with federal labor laws instead of more restrictive to the state’s employers,” he said. Poizner also insisted again that the business permitting process in the state must be simplified and streamlined.

Poizner stressed that while liberals ask how he will pay for his reforms, he said that “tax reductions always result in overall increases in spending as well as creating more tax revenue to the state through the additional spending. The loosening up of regulations and taxing on all businesses – large and small – results in dramatic increases in state revenue, while increasing regulations and taxes on business only serve to strangle commerce in the state.”

And how does he plan to implement such changes? “I will use the full powers bestowed on the governor from day one,” he said.  He plans on making use of the line-item veto as often as is necessary “to prevent the kind of spending the Democrats keep presenting.”  Poizner said he will make conservative and thoughtful appointments and if the Legislature proves uncooperative, he will take his message directly to the voters through initiatives.

CalWatchdog has also asked for interviews with candidates Republican Meg Whitman and Democrat Jerry Brown, but as yet, they have not replied.

PHOTO: INDIAN WELLS — SEPT 26: Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner at the CRP Convention, Indian Wells, California, September 26, 2009. (David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images)

Feb. 2, 2010 Editor's Note: The GOP gubernatorial race has turned particularly contentious, as Steve Poizner accused Meg Whitman of trying to muscle him out of the race. Here is an interview CalWatchdog recently had with Poizner. We are trying to arrange interviews with the other candidates. ...

An Interview With Poizner

California Local Government's Rising Revolt Against AB 32

On Thursday the Mojave Desert Air Quality District (MDAQD) sent a letter to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger regarding implementation of the controversial AB 32 – California's Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.

Under AB 32, the state will attempt to lower its emissions of greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020, and 80 percent below that threshold by 2050.

California’s growing population makes these ambitious targets, particularly the latter, which will likely require a reshaping of everyday life for individuals, businesses and local governments.

Written by the Chairman of Mojave Desert Air Quality District's Governing Board, Charley Glasper, the letter outlines a laundry list of concerns and is significant for one crucial reason: The letter could mark the beginning trend of a local government revolt against California’s Global Warming Solutions Act.  In part, the letter notes:

The board is very concerned about the potential impacts of the full implementation of the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (AB32).  Within theMDAQMD’s jurisdiction – which includes the High Desert portion of San Bernardino County and the Palo Verde Valley of Riverside County – we are rapidly approaching “regulatory gridlock” which not only threatens to cripple the economy, but also hinders our agency’s ability to adequately protect the local air quality and health of our residents… we are finding that, in an era of unique economic and regulatory challenges like ours, there are serious conflicts among existing and potential proposed regulator programs.

Trying to unravel the exact costs for implementing all the pieces of AB 32 is a difficult exercise.  However, in both direct budgetary expenditures and in indirect economic impacts, the costs of implementing AB 32 are bound to be enormous.

From the beginning, the legislation was sold as a cost effective way of avoiding the catastrophic consequences of anthropomorphic global warming in California.  But as the MDAQD letter demonstrates, it is becoming ever more apparent that implementing AB 32 in California's current economic climate could have devastating effects.

When California enacted AB 32 the state's economy was growing and the jobless rate was 5%.  Today the jobless rate is 12.4%, 2.25 million Californians are unemployed, the state government is broke and local governments are struggling to make ends meet.
 
A 2009 study by economists at the California State University at Sacramento and commissioned by the California Small Business Roundtable found that the implementation costs "could easily exceed $100 billion" and that the program would raise the cost of living by $3,857 per household each year by 2020.

The CSU Sacramento study concludes that when California’s climate change program is fully implemented, the average annual loss in gross state output from small businesses alone would be $182.6 billion, approximately a 10% loss in total gross state output. This will translate into nearly 1.1 million lost jobs in California. Lost labor income is estimated to be $76.8 billion, with nearly $5.8 billion lost in indirect taxes. This decline in revenues will have a severe impact on future state budgets. 
 
No matter what the costs one thing is for certain, as noted by the Southern California Leadership Council, implementation of AB 32 means changing the way Californians live and do business, perhaps dramatically. The process of adapting to AB 32 will occur over a period of years. Change of this magnitude increases uncertainty and will impose costs and other burdens on those [firms and individuals] charged with implementing the new rules and regulations.

As California struggles amidst the worst economy since the Great Depression, as lawmakers grapple with a $20 billion deficit many, including the Chairman of the MDAQMD, believe that now is not the time to move ahead with implementation of the Act:   

Given the current economic and regulatory situation, this District proposes that a more considered and overarching approach is necessary.  There will be a time and a place for AB 32implementation, but we do not believe that now - during the worst economic climate since the Great Depression - is the appropriate time.

Whether or not one agrees with the goals of AB 32, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the costs associated with implementation will have significant adverse impacts on California’s economy, consumers, and small businesses.  Costs that California cannot afford.