Schwarzenegger declares fiscal emergency

SFGate.com ^ | December 1, 2008 | JULIET WILLIAMS

[Oyarsa]

(12-01) 16:38 PST Sacramento, CA (AP) --

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a fiscal emergency on Monday and called lawmakers into a special budget session, warning that California was in danger of running out of daily operating cash within two months.

The special session will force the new Legislature to get to work immediately and figure out a way to solve the $11.2 billion budget deficit in the current fiscal year. The governor's declaration came just days after a previous special session with the outgoing class of lawmakers failed to produce a compromise.

Unless budget corrections are made quickly, the state is likely to run out of cash in February and see its revenue gap widen to $28 billion over the next 19 months.

Schwarzenegger said legislators so far have failed to grasp the seriousness of the crisis, which is growing worse by the day.

[camle]

declaring a fiscal emergency is merely a tactic in order to gain enough public support to raise taxes on the people.

cutting spending never occurs to these folk.

[madison10]

Good job, Arnold. /sarc

[sasquatch]

Good thing John Laird did such a good job. Imagine how bad it could have been. Its also great to know that he landed another 130K state job.

[RetiredArmy]

Let's see, Arnold Schwartzkennedy got elected by damning Davis over his handling of the Kaliforniastan economy. Now he has run it into the ground, kind of like Bush, he could not control his lust to spend, spend, spend on illegals and liberal agendas. So, Arnold, who in my opinion is the poster boy for the current RINO Republicans, is beloved by the Marxists, because he is one of them in heart, mind and soul.

[econjack]

Ok, Arnold, here's what you do. You hold a press conference tomorrow morning and announce that every state budget now has X-percent (fill in your own amount) less funds than it did yesterday. You then state: “This measure is necessary to assure the ongoing state services. Any department head who cannot continue to provide services of equal quantity and quality during the next six months will be replaced by someone who can. Thank you for your attention...have a nice day.”

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Cut every state agency budget by 5 percent. Do it again.

[Yo-Yo]

Just sell more bonds, Arnie, “for the peoples.”

[OB1kNOb]

I bet Californians wish they had voted in McClintock back in 2003, now.

[Red Badger]

(Lets Get) Fis-i-cal
With apologies to Olivia Newton John

I’m saying all the things that I know you’ll like,
Makin’ good conversation
I gotta handle you just right,
You know what I mean
I took you to an intimate restaurant,
Then to a suggestive movie
There’s nothin’ left to talk about,
Unless it’s horizontally

Let’s get fis-i-cal, fis-i-cal,
I wanna get fis-i-cal, let’s get into fis-i-cal
Let me hear your body talk,
Your body talk, let me hear your body talk

I’ve been patient, I’ve been good,
Tried to keep my hands on the table
It’s gettin’ hard this holdin’ back,
You know what I mean
I’m sure you’ll understand my point of view,
We know each other mentally
You gotta know that you’re bringin’ out
The animal in me

Let’s get animal, animal,
I wanna get animal, let’s get into animal
Let me hear your body talk,
Your body talk, let me hear your body talk

[DoughtyOne]

We need a recall that sees every elected official in our state government tossed out on their asses.

Malfeasance doesn’t begin to describe how incompetently these jerks have ruled.

[shadowgovernment]

you got it right..higher taxes drive business out, so the solution..higher taxes..
Is it me or is every elected official just plain nuts?

[rstark56]

(in arhnold voice) GET OUT!

[goldstategop]

The Democrats don't care and neither do the unions that control their purse-strings. They will raise taxes to devastate the economy and buy more time to prolong the party. The last thing that will happen in California is an end to business as usual.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Dilbert San Diego]

I don’t get this. In early September, I think it was, they finally agreed on a balanced budget for the fiscal year of July 1, 2008 to June 30, 2009. The budget was allegedly balanced at that time up through next June. Then within a couple of weeks of that budget being approved, all this news about how the budget is out of control and the state running out of money came out.

What the heck? Was the budget really balanced to start with in September? Something doesn’t add up. Pardon the pun, that things don’t add up, since we’re talking about the budget numbers here.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

There hasn’t been “business as usual” in California for a long time.

[camle]

if you want to stifle something, tax it. if you want to reward something, subsidize it. one can tell a lot about california by what it taxes, and what it subsidizes.

has there ever been a go vernment ‘crises’ that HASN’T resulted in higher taxes?

[Frantzie]

Wall Street Journal this morning had an editorial how Repubs need to embrace open-borders and illegal aliens. The WSJ is a crap paper now. Another WSJ article showed which states have a defecit. The biggest were CA, NY and now FL.

FL is never in that position! Crist is a RINO but my guess is it is Medicaid costs due to illegal aliens. The Fed mandates require the states to provide endless benefits for illegals. If these benefits ended - all of these states would have balanced budgets.

[camle]

the ‘excuse’ is that people’s stock holdings aren’t making the (taxable) income they used to, and that there is a revenue shortfall to be made up.

I wonder how much of this scarce tax money they’re spending on illegals?

[ican'tbelieveit]

They definitely don’t have the ability to say NO. NO, we can’t afford that new social program right now. All about getting relected, and those that say no don’t get reelected.