Oops, I was off a bit.. found this . excerpt with link
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/003/170xlyas.asp?pg=1
The Red Ink State
Gray Davis as governor: every bit as bad as you've heard.
by Stephen Moore
10/06/2003, Volume 009, Issue 04
Weekly Standard
...nothing can compare with Davis's ineptitude in handling the budget crisis. In five years, he has somehow converted a $12 billion budget surplus into a $38 billion deficit. In 1998 California had the largest surplus of any state in the nation. Today, California's deficit is larger than the deficits of the other 49 states combined. As the state's chief financial officer, Davis has allowed the debt rating of the state to be downgraded three times in three years; its status is now just marginally above that of junk bonds.
All of this grim news has been fairly well documented. But what is not well known is the hideous depth of this fiscal swamp. I have just returned from Sacramento, where I spent several days combing through the financial numbers, and I am convinced that, as angry and nervous as Californians are, they don't know the half of it. The Democratic line is that the worst of the budget disaster is behind California. Hardly. This state is a lot closer to an Argentina-style financial meltdown than a balanced budget. Every day that the Gray Davis-Cruz Bustamante administration stays in power, the state plunges another $20 million in debt.
In this year's budget process, Davis resorted to bookkeeping chicanery so fanciful it would have made a WorldCom accountant blush. Instead of balancing the budget, as is conventionally defined and required by the state constitution, Davis borrowed $10.7 billion and then declared the cash inflow "revenues" to put the budget in balance. This loan came on top of the $50 billion in outstanding state and local bonds California is already carrying on its books. John Cogan of the Hoover Institution, a leading expert on the California state budget, grimly notes that "Davis is the first governor in California history to eviscerate the balanced budget requirement by issuing billions of dollars of debt without a vote of the people." Then he adds: "This may also be the first time a state has ever balanced its budget by borrowing."
Ahnold is only giving the Sheeple what they want. People don't want fiscal responsibility. People want government spending. The only time they care about deficits is when it results in higher taxes... and even then, they don't care unless the tax hike effects them personally.
excellent sourcing, Marine.
well considering the coffers went from a 12 billion dollar surplus to a 38 billion dollar deficit; I'd say a 50 billion dollar Davis debt would equal the incompetency of the RINOld administration who has had a HUGE influx of revenue in the last year or so...
well, I won't say "I told ya so"....