Gamble: Davis bets the state budget on his re-election

The one thing we have going for us is that it takes a 2/3 vote of the legislature to raise taxes. That's going to be tough going in an election year. I expect Davis to have to use rosy revenue projections (based on pure fiction, but nobody but Kathleen Connell will say anything) and borrowing to close most of the gap.

If California got the money stolen by Enron and Reliant back, we'd have a surplus now. I'm no Davis fan but I know when I've been screwed and who by and it was Enron and Reliant and no kiss.

I didn't see a sarcasm tag, so I'm going to believe that you were serious - seriously gullible (either that or you're a Rat party hack).

Lets say that you're boss didn't give you a raise for 10 years (price controls on the purchase price of energy). During that 10 years, you got married, moved out of your parents house and bought a house, and had three kids (the cost of energy went up). Your company refused to allow you to take on a part time job, and there was no overtime to help increase your take home pay (the environmentalist wackos prevented the power companies from building nuke plants, prevented exploring and drilling new oil wells, and since the purchase price for energy remained constant, you could not afford to build more efficient fossile fuel power plants).

Over time, as the cost of living increased each year, and without being able to increase your take-home pay, you find yourself unable to meet the monthly bills and are already in debt up to eyeballs. You'd probably blame the phone company, the cable company, the mortgage company, the grocery store owner, Walmart and Ford. NOT - It was you boss's restrictions that caused you the problem, not the businesses.

The same applies to the power companies servicing Kalifornia. You can't cap the purchase price, without subsidizing the supply side. Well, last summer was the subsidy, and it will continue until power companies are able to do what they do best - explore for new sources of energy, building newer more efficient plants, and charge customers the going rate at the time consumption takes place.

Much like the property tax caps, its all gonna come home to roost. Nothing like putting your head in the sand. Freeze property taxes so nobody realizes we're spending money like it was going out of style.

For petesake, wake up and smell the coffee

DURN TOOTIN' PING

"He's fleen' the interview, he's fleen' the interview."-(Marge as Jerry Gustafuson drives out of the car lot.)

We have our political problems here in Wisconsin but I'm glad I don't live in Californistan. Hopefully in twelve hours we will have a REPUBLICAN County Excutive in Milwaukee County. If we don't; I will be setting off for some desert island in the South Pacific. Keep your fingers crossed. Milwaukee county went 60% for Algore in 2000. I believe we have narrow chance to win this thing.

Clearly, Davis hopes that he can borrow and bob his way out of the budget mess until Nov. 5, then deal with the consequences after the election while hoping the economic recovery is stronger and faster than most economists believe.

What a gamble! With our state! With our money!

Dump Davis!