I simply could not believe it when I opened the paper this morning and read the following quote from "Republican" San Diego Councilman Jim Madaffer:
"At end of the day I know why we have these problems," Councilman Jim Madaffer said, "it’s because the city of San Diego has an underfunding problem."
I know Jim Madaffer pretty well. I know his heart is in the right place. The problem is, I question where his head is. I believe that he still does not recognize that the City of San Diego has one of the nation’s most irresponsible records on the spending of taxpayer dollars. That they have blown hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on outrageous pensions and chronic waste, fraud, and mismanagement. That taxpayers should not and will not stand for pouring more of their money into this pit until the spending is brought under control, and accountability measure are put into place.
The problem, Councilman Madaffer, is not that the taxpayers are haven’t thrown City Hall even more money. City Hall’s budget has increased dramatically over the past several years. The problem is that you and the ‘Murphy’ Council think that in good times its ok to spend past what any reasonable person would spend, make financially unsound promises, and in bad times stretch out your hand and beg for more instead of doing your job and cutting the waste for which our city is so infamous.
This was the most disapointing quote I’ve read all year.
March 29th, 2007 at 12:00 am
Many elected officials begin their service as Ambassadors FROM the people
TO the government, communicating the needs and concerns of the citizens to
the faceless monolith.
Then they experience a “Metamorphosis”, gradually becoming Ambassadors
FROM the government TO the citizens.
Then they communicate how ungrateful the citizens are, and how they don’t
understand the need for more taxes, fees and regulations. “Funding” is their
favorite euphemism for “tax increase”.
In the British Empire this was called “going native”. The elected officials who
do this would be wise to remember Tip O’Neill’s famous advice to freshmen
members of Congress, “Never forget who you are, or where you came from.”