State Senate Republican Leader Dave Cogdill has an editorial on our friend Joel Fox’s Fox and Hounds website where he talks about the urgency of placing a water bond measure on the November ballot — because the crisis facing California in terms of the ability to store water and move water around the state is quickly reaching a crisis point (some would say we’re already there).
I agree that something needs to be done.
But first we need to acknowledge two important reasons why we are at this crisis point, and then we need to look at the likely reason why it may be impossible for conservatives of conscience to support a November measure placed on the ballot by the legislature.
Why are we in this crisis? First and foremost is the screwed up long term budget priorities of the Democrats who have controlled the legislature, pretty much for decades. They have not been allocating a significant percentage of general fund dollars annually for any infrastructure investment, let alone for water. These liberals are far too interested in trying to move general fund money into welfare programs, on their endless quest to use government as a tool to redistribute wealth.
The other reason for the crisis? The enviro-nuts, who refuse to prioritize the needs of people over flowers and bugs, refuse to support any new dams in California, citing the negative impact on the underlying eco-system. These are the same folks who, if you get into a debate with them, admit that they wish we could slowly but surely withdraw mankind’s "incursion" into many areas of the world.
Now we get to the biggest problem of all. The liberals who control the legislature know all too well that Republicans (hence the piece from Cogdill) are very intent on solving our state’s water problem — I guess we are the party of water for peope… There is no doubt that in order to pass a water bond package through the legislature, it will require literally BILLIONS of dollars in spending on a huge wish-list (created in a conference room at the Sierra Club, no doubt) to be larded up in what should otherwise be a very modest proposal of a few billion dollars.
This is why I cannot imagine a situation where principled conservatives could vote for a deal. The package put forward by Governor Schwarzenegger and Dianne Feinstein purports to be a "compromise" bond — but I look at its staggering nearly $10 BILLION price tag, and wonder to myself — compromise with whom? Certainly not with fiscal conservatives who only want to support the borrowing necessary to store and convey water.
For the people of California to not get gauged and blackmailed into BILLIONS in non-essential borrowing, the problem will simply have to get bad enough so that there is enough support for a citizen-sponsored initative, external to the legislative process, where the bond measure excludes the Sierra Club wish list, and wisely spends our money and that of our children only on what is necessary.
The entire debate taking place in the State Capitol right now is about returning fiscal sanity to state spending. How we handle this important issue of water storage and conveyance, or perhaps I should say how we don’t handle it, will demonstrate whether Republican rhetoric is limited to a state budget, or if we apply the same standards against non-needed spending when we want to borrow money from taxpayers.
I applaud Senator Cogdill’s leadership on this issue, and encourage him as his Republican legislative colleagues to ensure that any bond measure doesn’t take us all to the cleaners — which should include a serious look at taking something to voters external to a legislative solution.
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