As we Californians head to the polls today to vote on ballot propositions related to the state’s finances, Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore remind us how the Golden State lost its luster:

Is it coincidence that the two highest tax-rate states in the nation, California and New York, have the biggest fiscal holes to repair? No. Dozens of academic studies — old and new — have found clear and irrefutable statistical evidence that high state and local taxes repel jobs and businesses.

(Via Instapundit.)

Basically these economists argue–and have the data to prove it–that when a state increases taxes, particularly on the “rich,” the more those wealthy individuals flee the state for one with lower taxes, sometimes taking their businesses with them.

After Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected in the 2003 recall to reform a state government that had grown by leaps and bounds under then-Governor Gray Davis, the incumbent Governor did little to undo the damage that Democrat had done.  Between 1999 when Davis took office and 2003 when citizens started organizing to recall him, the state had hired nearly 40,000 new full-time employees.  The latest figures (from 2007) show only a modest decline in that number.

While friends who work for private companies across the state report receiving pay cuts, state employees have not experienced similar salary reductions. Because of their influence, the public employee unions have succeeded in preventing the state from treating them as would a normal enterprise facing decline revenues;  they all but control the government in Sacramento.

Voting “Yes” on these propositions would do nothing to lessen their stranglehold on the California legislature.

We don’t need higher taxes to ensure essential services.  We just need fewer bureaucrats to administer them.   Indeed, these very bureaucrats, in administering the regulations passed by our nanny-state legislature, help stifle the innovation and entrepreneurial activity which once made California the envy of (and model for) the nation.

The more they regulate, the less productive are those who generate the revenues necessary to pay their salaries.

Higher taxes will only drive away those who have not already fled for states with a smaller tax burden.

By voting “No” on Measures 1A-E today, California voters will send a strong message to our elected officials in Sacramento.  We don’t like the way they’ve been running this state.  And we don’t want pay to fix their mistakes.

So, let’s see real budget reform instead.  And let’s see state our bureaucrats face the same challenges as do their private sector counterparts.  And our state legislators make the tough choices that families across the state have had to make in these tough economic times.

ADDENDUM:  Mark Tapscott offers a more detailed explanation of why Prop. 1-A is such a bad thing.

The treatment Carrie Prejean received from the MSM and left-of-center blogs was yet another manifestation of their attitude toward a conversation on gay marriage.  They don’t want one.  They just want states to recognize gay marriage, insisting anyone who opposes this goal deserves to be demonized.

The issue with Carrie Prejean was not where someone stands on gay marriage, but where he stands on civil discourse.

I have long believed that a serious, civil conversation on the issue would serve us well.  It would help gay people understand the meaning and see the benefits of the ancient and honorable institution.  It would allow straight people to see gay people defending long-term committed relationships, helping correct certain societal prejudices about people like us.

It is troubling that all too many at the forefront of the gay marriage movement are so unwilling to talk about the institution that occupies so much of their waking life.  Surely, if they understood the history of the institution, they would recognize why people like Miss Prejean define it as they do.  And they would develop arguments to respond to her concerns.

So, I put the question to you, my readers, why are many advocates of gay marriage so quick to insult the opponents of this social change and so reluctant to articulate it benefits?

When one blogger caught the unhappy Barney Frank lying about his record and trying to “to re-write history with respect to the role he played in helping enable the collapse of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae,” I wrote:

In the past, he could get away with it because the media watchdogs, ever eager to pounce at the slightest Republican indiscretion, gave Democrats a pass whenever they misrepresented their own record. . . . It seems that Barney is living in a pre-YouTube world where . . . the MSM would be little likely to dig around into [a Democrat's] past statements to corroborate or contradict his present claims.

Seems the woman the Massachusetts Democrat helped elected as House Speaker has not realized how new media have transformed the political landscape.  She seemed entirely unprepared for anyone to challenge her recollections of her past actions and knowledge.

Simply put, she thought she could get away with misrepresenting the record probably because she assumed the MSM was behind the real goal–”getting” George W. Bush and his “minions.”

Perhaps, she assumed the Administration, equally eager (in her mind) to undermine its Republican predecessors, would back her up on this.   (more…)

Candidate Barack Obama, October 15, 2008, third presidential debate:

But there is no doubt that we’ve been living beyond our means and we’re going to have to make some adjustments.

Now, what I’ve done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut.

Economist Kevin Hassett, May 19, 2009, Bloomberg News columnist:

Extrapolating out the 2007 CBO forecast, our government plans to spend about $5.6 trillion more between 2009 and 2018 than was projected to be spent when the Democrats took over control of Congress.

To put that number in perspective, at the start of the 2007 budget year, Democrats inherited $4.8 trillion in outstanding government debt. That means that all of the deficits that have been run through all of history, funds that were used to finance the Vietnam War and the Iraq War and everything else in between, would be smaller than the spending increases of Democrats over the next 10 years if they are permitted to stay in power and keep up this pace.

(H/t for Hassett quote:  The Corner.)

At Geithner’s Treasury, Key Decisions on Hold. ”At the rate they’ve been going, I see this as a feature, not a bug . . .”

Last week, when I saw Rasmussen reported that for “the second straight week . . . Republican candidates . . . lead Democrats by a single point this week in the Generic Congressional Ballot,” I noticed, when perusing the actual numbers, that this was not so much a shift to the GOP, but rather a shift from the Democrats.

To note, in Rasmussen’s last pre-election poll (11-02-08), Democrats led 47-41, while last week (05-10-09), they had fallen to a 39-40 deficit.  The Democrats had fallen 8 points while the GOP tally was virtually unchanged.  

Today, Jim Geraghty has a post which appears to confirm that slippage, linking a Gallup poll which shows parity for the parties, significant slippage for the Democrats, insignificant for the GOP:

Their most recent poll, conducted May 7–10, splits 32 percent for each party, with 34 percent for independents. When they press the independents for which party they lean towards, it comes out to another split, this time 45 percent for each.

Perhaps, when the Republican Party, just now beginning to show some signs of life, regains some of the credibility it lost when it abandoned the principles which defined it, it can gain from the Democrats’ losses.

For now, it appears, the the American people have lost confidence in both parties.  Should that mistrust increase, it can only benefit the party out of power, now the GOP, as it benefitted the Democrats in 2006 and 2008.  

Because memories of the most recent Republican President are still fresh, perhaps people still don’t see the GOP as the out-of-power party.

In a must-read post on how leading Democrats cannot escape the goddess of retributive justice, Nemesis (“related to the Greekword νείμειν, meaning ‘to give what is due’“), Victor Davis Hanson gets at the essence of the coming fall of the Democratic Speaker of the House:

A Nancy Pelosi, hellbent on releasing once-classified memos for partisan advantage, and eager to begin ‘Truth” hearings, suddenly believes such an inquisition will not apply to herself, despite the fact that she, like so many Democrats from Senator Schumer to Senator Rockefeller, in that dark period in 2001, spoke of the need for, or was complicit in, approving enhanced interrogation techniques.

It seemed Democrats were certain to face a fall for their obsession with destroying George W. Bush and discrediting his team even after that good man left office.  Nancy overreached and even the Administration is distancing itself from her.

The leading Democrat in the House of Representatives got caught in the web in which she–and her party (as well as their cheerleaders in the MSM and left-wing blogs)–have long been trying to ensnare the former President and his party.

If the Democrats had left well enough alone, bid George W. Bush adieu (and even good riddance) when his term ended just four months ago, they might have been spared seeing the complete embarrassment of the Speaker.  Now, the American people will see not just the dishonesty of the woman who just over two years ago promised “the most honest” Congress in history but also the obsession of her team with George W. Bush.

Blaming the former President only goes so far.  The more time passes since the end of the term, the more people will see Democratic attacks as an excuse for failing to meet the country’s challenges.

Scapegoating George W. Bush is no way to govern a country.

The crowd was about the same size as the first Tea Party I attended, somewhere between 150 and 200 people, but as diverse as past gatherings had been.  Met some recent USC graduates who started up their own blog, the Dana Report.  They’re going to be the vanguard of the movement to start making young people see the error of their ways and move over to the Republican side of the aisle.

It’s a scarcity of employment opportunities and a longing for freedom which will help change their minds.

Here are a few pictures I took:

That’s Tony Katz speaking, one of the rally organizers, and all around nice guy:

The focus of this particular Tea Party was the measures on Tuesday’s ballot in the Golden State.  Participants, like this woman, were more than just opposed to the propositions.  She favored a “No” vote on all six.  Some people  intend to vote “Yes” on 1-F, as it would bar salary hikes for Golden State legislators in deficit years.  Personally, I think we should cut salaries of all state bureaucrats as many private sectors have had to take salary cuts in this economy.

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I was watching Mutiny on the Bounty, the 1962 remake with Brando when I started feeling the shaking.   This shaking seemed more intense than the last one I experienced.  More intense, perhaps but not as long.  I can still feel the vibrations in my arm.

Perhaps because I was just watching a movie about the sea, this image comes to mind–kind of how you feel after you’ve been in a boat all day. 

A few things fell off shelves, but the books remained in place.  It took about 20 seconds to pick up all the things that had fallen.  After the first rumblings, I wasn’t quite sure what to do.  I made sure I had a bottle of water handy in case there was an aftershock.  I only felt one other, about 5 minutes later, much less severe than the first one.

And this time, I wondered if I should wash my dinner dish or go outside.  Ah, the choices we face when a minor earthquake we experience.

Welcome Instapundit Readers!  I want to thank Glenn for this unexpected (but not unwelcome) link; it has led to one of the best comment threads we’ve had in some time.  So, thank you Instapundit Readers for contributing to a spirited, thoughtful and civil conversation!

Every once in a while, I read a comment from a civil critic which helps me put my own worldview into perspective.  Responding to Average Gay Joe’s post linking a Podcast Interview of Lt. Daniel Choi, reader CR  did just that:

I have to honestly confess my surprise at how supportive the GP bloggers have been of Choi. I’m particularly surprised given that, as a moderate who is somewhat to the left of GP-residents, I actually don’t have a lot of sympathy for him. 

His surprise made me realize that while I consider myself conservative, on some issues, I’m to the “left” of my party and even to the “left” of some of our critics.  I put the word, left, in quotation marks because sometimes the traditional “direction” of our partisan politics just plain don’t work.  When I have written about Lt. Choi, it just didn’t occur to me that someone might perceive me to be departing from principles I had put forward on this blog.  (To be sure, I was aware that I am at odds with many in my party on the issue).

I’ve always supported a strong military, opposing restrictions, generally coming from well-meaning liberals, which decrease its effectiveness.  And that’s how I see the ban on gays serving openly.  It serves no purpose, save to placate those holding on to long discredited prejudices against gay people.  And it deprives the military of qualified personnel.

Perhaps I’m more sympathetic to Lt. Choi’s outspokenness on this issue because, as a gay conservative, I see the benefits in being open about one’s sexuality.  Coming out in right-of-center confabs has allowed me to see how my conservative confrères react to a gay man in their midst and to show that not all gay people subscribe to the politically correct orthodoxy of the far left.

In a similar manner, I welcome Lt. Choi’s openness.  He provides yet another example of how ably a gay man can serve in our armed forces.

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Since many of our critics delight in demonizing W, often using the comments section of posts where we don’t even highlight the former president’s merits nor acknowledge his failings to remind us how the Republican remains, in their view, a horrible, no good, very bad man, I thought I’d offer them a little challenge so they could put their money where the mouth is and show how truly intolerant, narrow-minded and hateful this man was.

So, here’s the challenge:

Recall how back in March 2003, just before US troops invaded Iraq to liberate that nation from Saddam Hussein, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks told a London audience: 

Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all.  We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas.

A singer for an American country music trio denounces her nation’s president on foreign soil.  And this was only the beginning of the group’s attacks on the then-President.

Given the Dixie Chicks’ attacks on Bush, surely that Republican, being as horrible as you say, must have done something to censure, if not censor, the group.  Please provide evidence of his criticism–or that of any official spokesman–for the White House (at the time).   Please show how he coordinated efforts to denounce the group and/or use their criticism to his political advantage.

For this challenge, I’m not interested in what conservative bloggers, pundits or radio hosts had to say.  The issue here is the supposedly maleficent Bush.  Here’s your chance.   Show how truly bad this man was, in how he reacted to this criticism.

If you come up empty-handed, then you’re free to provide examples of him denouncing or prosecuting others protesting the Iraq War.

To show that despite the rhetoric of gay and lesbian legislators, many gay people do not support an ever bigger state government, join me and other Angelenos today Sunday, May 17 at 3 PM at the Federal Building in Westwood 11000 Wilshire Blvd @ Veteran (just e of the 405) for a Tea Party to protest Proposition 1-A.

While the upcoming ballot measures will be the focus of this particularly rally, we’ll be standing strong not just for budgetary restraint at the state level, but also in Washington.

It’s not just “right-wing hardliners” who favor responsible budgeting in Sacramento — and our nation’s capital.

Via Twitter, Patrick Ruffini reminds us that back in 2000, Barack Obama had had trouble renting a car for the 2000 Democratic National Convention because “his credit card was maxed out.”

Looks like he’s basing his budgetary policy on his past personal finances.   Wonder if the country can get a book deal, like he did, to get out of the debt he’s accumulating.

With just a few tens of trillion in sales, that should be able to restore sound budgeting.   But, it would take everyone on the planet buying books at the rate I do to cover generate sales like that.

If you just read what those on on the left, particularly the gay left, and in their MSM echo chamber said about Carrie Prejean without hearing the beauty queen’s actual words, you might have thought she had slandered gays, saying that the reason “homosexuals” weren’t worthy of state-sanctioned married was because we were perverts, incapable of relationship.

But, she didn’t smear us. She just articulated how she defined marriage — which is how all societies have defined the institution since time immemorial, by gender difference.* 

Even though she expressed an opinion nearly identical to that of the President of the United States, she became a punching bag for the politically correct, even for one of his closest advisors. 

She might have merited such mockery had she truly derided gay people, but she didn’t.  It just makes you wonder about the need of so many to vilify the politically incorrect.  Considering why she didn’t say makes wonder me if their issue is not with her, but with themselves.

* (more…)

Nancy Pelosi’s readiness to blame the Bush Administration, the “all-purpose political punching bag” of liberal imagination, for her own imperfections, indicates that President Obama has yet broken the “pattern in Washington where everybody is always looking for somebody else to blame.”

If the President truly wishes to change the tone in our nation’s capital, he’s going to have to do two things, first, refrain from blaming his predecessor for the nation’s problems (and otherwise fault Republican motives) and second, dare to take his own party and other critics of Republicans to task for casting such blame as well as leveling vicious personal attacks (questioning their motives and maligning them personally).

To that end, he should insist that all focus their criticisms on particular policies, understanding that people with various political philosophies will offer different solutions to our nation’s problems.  He would truly change their tone by expressing respect for their motives, asserting that they put forward their proposals with the best of intentions.

He could have taken a step in that direction had he criticized Wanda Sykes for wishing death on Rush Limbaugh at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner last week. He had a golden opportunity then, just as he had during his inauguration when guests booed the outgoing President of the United States, to live up to the rhetoric of his campaign by challenging those whose very rhetoric undermines that of his campaign.

Barack Obama won last fall’s campaign in large part because he put forward an image of a level-headed man who could unite the nation.  His friendship in the Senate with Tom Coburn, one of its most conservative members, was testament to his ability to bridge the partisan divide.  Unfortunately, despite a few token gestures to Republicans in Congress, he has done little to acknowledge the sincerity of (most) conservative criticism of his policies and to fault the continued mean-spirited record of (some of) his supporters and their partisan allies.

His image during the primaries moved even a Republican like myself.  Now, as president, he needs to burnish that image and reinforce it through rhetoric and actions.  His decision to tap Utah’s Republican Governor as Ambassador to China is a step in the right direction.  Now he needs back up that action with strong, unifying rhetoric.

He could take his cue from the language similar to that of such liberal icons as Hubert Humphrey and Bobby Kennedy–promoting liberal ideas without maligning conservative individuals.

There is a a certain poetic justice in the travails of the Democratic Speaker of the House.  She joined her partisan colleagues in the zeal to prosecute Bush Administration officials for what the MSM has labeled “torture memos.”  And now it seems her grandstanding may cost her her job, possibly hurting her party’s standing with the general public.

No one seems to believe Nancy Pelosi.

Having promised “the most honest, most open and most ethical Congress in history,” Mrs. Pelosi now becomes emblematic of an institutions in which the Democratic culture of corruption (to borrow an expression of which she was once so fond) rivals (and perhaps exceeds) that of the last Republican Congress.

You know a Democrat’s in trouble when the editorialist of the Washington Post question her credibility:  ”Ms. Pelosi’s shifting accounts and faltering performance at her news conference were far from reassuring.”  

As she begins to lose the trust of a number in the MSM who would normally be sympathetic to her, she does what most Democrats do when the spotlight is turned on them:  blame Bush.  ”Pelosi issued a statement late Friday shifting her criticism to the Bush administration – hours after CIA Director Leon Panetta defended his agency against Pelosi’s charges.”

Part of that criticism was to accuse Bush and his team of lying us into war in Iraq.  Never mind that those who leveled the charge could not point to a single statement that then-President made that he knew was wrong at the time he made it.  Now, we have an example of a claim Pelosi made with ample evidence indicating that she knew it was false at the time she made.

(In her defense, maybe she had forgotten what she learned during those CIA briefings in 2002-03.  But, instead of faulting her memory, she has accused the CIA of misleading Congress.)

It will be interesting to see if the same left-wing bloggers who repeated the mantra that Bush lied (without providing any actual evidence that he did) will similarly criticize the Democratic Speaker for her dishonesty (with substantial evidence that she lied).

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A friend forwarded an e-mail he received from Equality California (EQCA), the Golden State advocacy group which “works to achieve equality and secure legal protections for LGBT people.”  In that missive, the supposed gay rights’ group aligns itself with those who would increase the power of the state government in Sacramento, making it easier for legislators to raise taxes while supporting measures which all but ratify the state’s ever-expanding budget.

Once again, this gay group stands with the public employee unions and other special interest groups which oppose real reform of our bloated state budget:

Our friends in the LGBT Legislative Caucus asked EQCA to send out this important message about Tuesday’s election. Although EQCA PAC has not taken a position on these measures, below please find the unanimous recommendations of our LGBT legislators for your consideration. And remember to vote on Tuesday, May 19.

So, if they’re not taking a position on these measures, why did they feel compelled to send out this e-mail to their listserv?   

Perhaps because in the letter, the gay and lesbian legislators attack Republicans and “right-wing hardliners,” the demons whom gay groups must always malign (it’s an article of faith to them):

Because of an arcane rule that gives Republicans veto power over our state budget, we have already been forced to make drastic cuts to vital state programs such as health care, education and environmental protection.

If these measures do not pass, the right-wing hardliners are determined to “starve” state government by slashing schools, health care and hard-fought social and environmental protections will only be encouraged. 

Note that these criticisms have nothing to do with gay issues.  Note also how they repeat the left-wing lie about how the state legislature already made “drastic cuts” to “vital state programs.”  Drastic cuts?  Hardly?  With the highest tax rate in the nation, the Golden State has the biggest budget gap.  It’s failure to make such cuts which has caused that shortfall.

If they define those who want responsible state budgeting as “right-wing hardliners,” then come next Tuesday, they’re going to see that a majority of voters in this very blue state belong to this intransigent group of conservatives.

Once again, the gay groups ally themselves with the political left–on issues not related to our sexuality, a sign that they’re more interested in advancing left-wing ideology than in promoting the rights of gay and lesbian citizens.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has alleged that the CIA lied to her, a criminal offense, given that she’s a Member of Congress.  Now, Cornell Law Professor William A. Jacobson is asking her to back up her charges:

The person two heartbeats away from the Presidency immediately should provide law enforcement officials with the evidence she has, including testimony under oath, to back up her allegations of criminal conduct by the CIA, so that a criminal investigation can proceed if warranted.

If the person two heartbeats away from the Presidency is not willing to put her own criminal liability on the line in making these accusations against the CIA, she should resign.

He’s right.  She has made an allegation and needs back it up.  And if she can’t, she should resign.

Sometimes, it seems Democrats are playing this partisan game where the object is to defeat, discredit or shame Republicans rather than serve the American people as a whole.  They sometimes forget they’re in positions of power and responsibility, controlling the fate of the nation.

Mrs. Pelosi sure isn’t acting like a responsible steward (or, given her gender, should I say stewardess?).

She’ll fight to the bitter end, but she’s on her way out.  She may last through this Congress, but the blood is already in the water.  Some in the media do seem to be covering for her, with the AP’s David Espo using his article on her press conference to lavish praise on Barack Obama and lambaste Republicans:

Pelosi’s decision to respond to her critics was something of a surprise, since most polls show Obama and his policies are popular, and Republicans have exhibited virtually nonstop political disarray in the six months since last fall’s elections.

What he says may be true, but has no place in an article like this, unless of course, you see journalism as a forum to cheerlead for Democratic policies and highlight Republican failings.

When, however, the MSM begin to address a Democrat’s failings, you know that they can no longer cover for her and have to cover her.  If she were a Republican, the writing would be on the wall.  Now, we’ve just got reporters wondering how to remove the pictures while they reach for their Sharpies.

It doesn’t help when a Washington Post reporter begins his article on the Speaker’s press conference yesterday when he blamed others rather than acknowledge her own misrepresentations by calling her credibility into question:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s extraordinary accusation that the Bush administration lied to Congress about the use of harsh interrogation techniques dramatically raised the stakes in the growing debate over the Bush administration’s anti-terrorism policies even as it raised some questions about the speaker’s credibility.

Pelosi’s performance in the Capitol was either a calculated escalation of a long-running feud with the Bush administration or a reckless act by a politician whose word had been called into question. Perhaps it was both.

The Bush Administration has long since left town and Democrats are still blaming the former Republican President. It does seem to be the defining article of their faith.

But, in going overboard trying to prosecute officials in that Republican’s Administration, Mrs. Pelosi seems to have gotten caught in a web of her party’s own making.  She’ll hold on for a while, perhaps until the end of this Congress.  With some of her partisan colleagues eager to see her gone, she’s going to have to fight to keep her job.

That could be a good thing as it will slow the expansion of government her party has planned and could shine a light on the disarray and corruption in the Democratic caucus.

Sometimes justice does prevail, even in a media culture and political system seemingly stacked against conservatives.

ADDENDUM:  Peter Wehner offers a nice summary of the situation: (more…)

(H/t:  The Campaign Spot.)