RIDER COMMENT: California’s first AB32 “cap-and-trade” auction raised only a tiny fraction of the revenue Democrats projected that the auction would bring in for the state (see SAC BEE article below).

This story didn’t make any waves. It should have. The billions that CA Democrats hope to gain from cap-and-trade auctions are largely illusionary dollars.

This “disappointing” auction result is a classic demonstration of the law of supply and demand. Many businesses have little use for such CA “pollution” credits if they are leaving the state — or at least have no plans to further expand in the state.

On the supply side, doubtless a number of businesses will want to sell their existing CA pollution credits ASAP, as they will have zero use for such a pollution license if/when they leave the Golden State.

This market message concerning CA’s economic future should be setting off Sacramento alarm bells. It’s not.

Instead, Sacramento is already budgeting to spend the projected revenue on pet projects, even… Read More

As I drove home from the airport upon returning from a recent trip to Florida, I nearly cracked my wheel in a huge pothole on the freeway. Adding insult to injury, as I exited the freeway, I barely dodged another pothole.

The roads and highways in Florida were smooth, well maintained and safe. Florida obviously uses its transportation funds and taxes for its roads. Who knows where California’s transportation funds go. And for that matter, who knows where most of the taxpayers’ money goes in this new California.

The new California is like New Math — a failed experiment. We’ve become a state of potholes, pervasive unions, professional politicians and police.

Politics

The California Republican Party really started to fall apart after electing Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor in the historic 2003 recall of Gov. Gray Davis.

Many citizens go into… Read More

I want to start this note with a correction. In the last post I made, I said that the post Watergate Republican Party had less than two thirds in each house of the Legislature. I was wrong on that count. I was relying on anecdotal evidence I received from members who were there when it happened, and who simply misremembered. There were 56 Assembly Democrats in the 1974-76 Legislature, well over the two thirds necessary for a veto proof majority, however in the Senate, there were only 26 Democrats, one shy of the two thirds. So, there were more Democrats in the Legislature then than there are now, but that was because the Assembly had two more Democrats than this Legislature, even though the Senate had one less. There was one statewide Republican officeholder (the Attorney General), Evelle Younger.

They recovered, and helped elect Ronald Reagan president six years later, with the help of Proposition 13 and a tough on crime stance that then Governor Jerry Brown helped with his pro-tax, soft on crime Governorship.

The Republicans then had several things going for them. The post Watergate vote was a one time reaction to the alleged crimes of the Nixon… Read More

In my previous post, I discussed how Republicans were guaranteed a majority of the Walnut Creek City Council by virtue of having four candidates, three Republicans and one decline-to-stater, running for three seats on the council. Two of these Republicans, Justin Wedel and Loella Haskew, were elected along with Mayor Bob Simmons. Wedel and Haskew join current Republican councilmember Cindy Silva to form a 3-2 council majority. Also notable is that Barry Grove, the Republican candidate with the closest ties to public employee unions, was not elected.

The Walnut Creek election was not the only one in Contra Costa in which our party’s candidates were successful. We also elected all three of our endorsed candidates to the Central Contra Costa Sanitary District—Paul H. Causey, Tad J. Pilecki, and James A. Nejedly—to the three seats being contested, and Tom Cleveland, CPA, to the Contra Costa Community College District, along with numerous other Republicans to many city and town councils throughout the county. Along with our successes electing our candidates, we were also successful in defeating the two countywide tax measures on the ballot: Measure A, a… Read More

Okay, my headline may not be the average forallCalifornia cities. But for the three cities that have been analyzed below, it IS true.

Yet if you believe our state’s highly respected (respected by the MSM, that is) elected Controller, Democrat John Chiang, you’d think many public employees are one paycheck away from going Dempsey Dumpster diving. That fiction is ablyrebuttedin the article below. As theclichésays, this is amust readpiece.

Here’s a quick comparison between the “average wages” used by Chiang and the more honest “average total compensation” cost to taxpayers.

Anaheim: “average wages” = $53,927.

Anaheim: “average total compensation” = $146,551.

Costa Mesa: “average wages” = $71,379.

Costa Mesa: “average total compensation” =… Read More

Compromise: First of all, thank you to all those who live in the new 45th Congressional District in California for your strong support of my reelection. It looks like I will have won by a margin of 18 points in spite of a new district (50% of which I have never represented), a poor year for Republicans and another opponent who spent many times more money than I did and spent it largely on negative advertising. I appreciate your confidence in me. I will not let you down.

But, I must confess, it didn’t feel much like a winning night. Frankly, I haven’t been this saddened in a very long time. Yes, I won convincingly, but politics is a team sport. I need friends and allies to get stuff done, and a lot of them lost.

I will let others do the political analysis of why the election turned out as it did. But, I will tell you that my sadness is much deeper than it was four years ago. In 2008, we were pretty sure that McCain was going to lose, and we had some hopefulness that Obama wouldn’t turn out to be as bad a president as we feared. But in 2012, we were pretty sure that Romney/Ryan were going to win, and we are pretty sure that Obama,… Read More

Some good news for the State of California…

The State Board of Equalization collected $1.86 billion in general fund sales and use tax revenue last month, surpassing the state’s $1.74 billion budget estimate.

The state’s year-to-date general fund sales and use tax revenues are now meeting projections. From July 1 through October 31, the state received $6.5 billion in revenue, narrowly exceeding the state’s budget projection.

October’s revenues came from sales taking place prior to the gas price spike of early October. Retailers must file returns monthly, quarterly or annually depending on the size of their business.

Let’s hope that stronger tax revenues are a reflection of a recovering economy rather than merely the result of higher prices.

… Read More

Prior to Prop 30 passing, CA already had the 2nd worst state income tax rate in the nation. Currently our 9.3% tax bracket starts at $48,029 for people filing as individuals.

Now our “millionaires’ tax” rate is 13.3% – including capital gains. Increased income taxes now start at $250K. And it is RETROACTIVE to 1 January, 2012!

So today CA has BY FAR the nation’s highest state income tax rate. We are 21% higher than the 2nd highest state (Hawaii), 34% higher than the 3rd highest state (Oregon), and a heck of a lot higher than all the rest – including 7 states with zero state income tax.

http://taxfoundation.org/sites/taxfoundation.org/files/docs/ff2012.pdf Tables #11 & 13

CA is so bad, we also have the 2nd highest state income tax bracket. AND the 3rd! Plus the 5th and 7th highest tax brackets.

Stated differently, we have 5 of the first 7 highest state income tax brackets — including the top 3. In the Olympics, that would be considered a medal sweep!… Read More