California's anti-tax crusaders talk revolt

Reuters ^ | 2009-04-07 | Dan Whitcomb

[rabscuttle385]

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Taking inspiration from a landmark 1970s tax revolt, a determined group of activists say the moment is right for another voter uprising in California, where recession-battered residents have been hit with the highest income and sales tax rates in the nation.

And like Proposition 13, the 1978 ballot measure that transformed the state's political landscape and ignited tax-reform movements nationwide, they see the next backlash coming not from either major political party, but from the people.

If the anti-tax crusaders can galvanize voter discontent, they hope to roll back the latest tax hikes, impose permanent, iron-clad spending caps on Sacramento lawmakers and make the issue central in the 2010 gubernatorial election.

"There's a lot of latent anger boiling to the surface out there," said Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, a group named after the California anti-tax crusader who spearheaded Prop 13.

An angry mob of thousands converged on an Orange County parking lot in southern California on a recent Saturday morning for an anti-tax protest, stunning even the organizers with the size of the turnout. It was just one in a series of public demonstrations that have cropped up around the state.

[CORedneck]

They also need to limit the time their legislature meets as well. Right now, CA is a full time (year round), professional legislature. They should return to being part time like before 1966 and even go as far as allow them to meet every other year for 60 days. Also all CA laws should be sunset within 5 years to force reenactment and review. In the time span, the supposed important laws will be reenacted. It should be done in parts. Take example, the California Vehicle Code. Each law should be reenacted. One bill for lights, another one concerning driver licenses, another bill for interstate compacts, so on.

[Cash Back Real Estate]

The problem with tax hikes is that it discourages lawful economic activity whereas tax reductions encourages lawful economic production.

[nathanbedford]

I consider earnestly such observations which come from a poster we all respect. I am pleased that you have noted that this is a problem of perception and not of actual racial bias.

The situation in California in which the politics of the state are now dominated by the influx of a race of people is a subject for legitimate discussion. That the Democrats frustrated Governor Pete Wilson's attempt to stanch this inflow was a political event. The Democrats have played the race card in California just as they played the race card in the election of Barak Obama. This has real significance for Americans. When they played the race card to derail efforts by the Bush administration to regulate Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae who were cooking the books on subprime loans, every American has ultimately suffered. The price of submitting to this kind of intimidation is real political and financial pain.

There are abundant electoral, legislative and regulatory actions conditioned by race in America, so to ignore the matter is to ignore reality. Therefore the question becomes, how obsequious must we be to the unspoken conventions of political correctness which have been created by liberals, partly for the purpose of shutting down debate, when we discuss these matters which simply must be discussed if we are to live in reality?

As you are aware from my about page, I have elected, consciously, to address the matter head on, unapologetically. You are quite correct to point out the down side of this approach. Liberals will certainly exploit any comment but they will, if necessary, also wrench plainly inoffensive comments out of context to prove their main justification for the vacuousness of their philosophy: conservatives are racists and they are not-or so they believe. I do not believe that we can successfully tiptoe through the minefield and still live out our franchise which is our birthright as Americans. So, concededly, the use of the name and avatar gives the left some ammunition. But I do not believe that we can appease our way to public acceptance. I believe that we must confront the problem of racism in politics especially as it is pursued by the left and that we should do so explicitly and without embarrassment. I have made a value judgment that this approach in the long run offers a better hope for persuading those who are persuadable than obscuring our being by confusing euphemism for honesty.

That is a judgment that says the Brand will ultimately prosper better this way.

For readers of this thread who are interested in this matter, I invite you to take a look at my about page for a fuller explanation.

Thank you, gray whiskers, for what I regard to be constructive criticism.

[DTogo]

I have long insisted on these threads that all politics in America is not local, but racial.

Huh?

[DTogo]

Do you have any idea of the racial background of fellow FReepers? Who’s white, who’s not, multi-racial/cultural/lingual marriages and kids?

[nathanbedford]

So, please don't be so quick to write off California or succumb to the tired tirade of it being 'ungovernable' or how everyone needs to move "leftward." What we need is moral support, not a bunch of outsiders telling us why it "can't be done."

I am at a loss to understand how you could possibly pry any of these accusations, three of which you draped in quotation marks, from my post?

[nathanbedford]

No, I do not. Those matters would probably be of interest to a liberal seeking to play the race card. They are a matter of indifference to me.

I invite you to take a look at my about page and to read my reply to gray whiskers.

[PMAS]

PING

[editor-surveyor]

Remembering Prop 13, both parties screamed bloody murder, that it would wipe out functional government, and wipe out police and fire departments, but it instead strengthened and stabilized local government.

Take no prisoners!

[editor-surveyor]

I think you need to read more of Laffer!

[calcowgirl]

I am at a loss to understand how you could possibly pry any of these accusations, three of which you draped in quotation marks, from my post?

First, I did not attribute any of those words in quotes to you. I asked that you not succumb to the tired tirades and offered up examples of those tirades that we so often hear here in California. Please read your post again. By saying that anectodal evidence is no evidence, or that it is idle to talk about grass roots rebellion ala 1978, it certainly took on a tone of surrender, to me. If you did not intend it to be that way, so be it.

As to some of your assertions, I did challenge them but you chose not to respond to that part. Tell me, on what do you base your observations of California? Have you lived here? Visited? For how long? To what parts? I'm curious as your comments about race, Pete Wilson, and others do not ring true for me.

[editor-surveyor]

What we need is moral support, not a bunch of outsiders telling us why it "can't be done."

AMEN !!!

[olivia3boys]

I don’t know; I live in California in a “moderate” district (Tauscher is my Rep, or was; I guess she just resigned her seat to join Obama’s fab cabinet), and let me just say:

The upper-middle class “moderate” Democrats all around me simply don’t mind paying more taxes.

Trust me. I’ve talked to them. They agree with higher taxes and feel that they, and others, simply don’t pay enough. They say they are “communitarians.”

They also don’t mind laws banning cell phones in cars or banning fires in fireplaces.

It’s quite bad out here.

[calcowgirl]

The Recall was truly a lost opportunity. The electorate was getting educated through talk radio and other venues about just how messed up the State was. The conservative solutions spread across the airwaves were embraced by most people... and showed to be the basis for a winning campaign. Unfortunately, that message got stolen by Schwarzenfraud to hijack the election and quickly abandoned on his trip to Sacramento.

[philetus]

By the time the tax revolt is over, we’ll be bowing to Allah.

The more Obama does, the more I think this Tea Party revolt is a distraction.

[nathanbedford]

So, please don't be so quick to write off California or succumb to the tired tirade of it being 'ungovernable' or how everyone needs to move "leftward." What we need is moral support, not a bunch of outsiders telling us why it "can't be done."(emphasis supplied)

I am content to let the reader of this thread judge whether or not you were admonishing me personally from your own words. I rely on the plain meaning of the English language. You said "please" indicating that she wanted me to do or refrain from doing something in this case to refrain from "write (ing) off" and "sucumb (ing)."you also admonished me not to be so "quick" about doing these heinous things.

Earlier in your remarks you identified me as being an outsider that is, from Germany. At the foot of your remarks you said, "What we need is moral support, not a bunch of outsiders telling us why it "can't be done."(emphasis supplied) Of course you were addressing the remarks to me; any reader of your remarks could have no other understanding than that.

I am always prepared to defend what I say but it's worse than tedious to have to defend what I did not say. You attributed remarks to me in quotations which you had no business doing. That is and obvious and objectively provable trespass in your reply. Perhaps worse because it is more insidious, was your attributing motives or views to me which simply were not expressed. That is a cheap and easy form of argumentation and I have every right to resist it and not permit myself to be tarnished with this trick.

[nathanbedford]

Or suffer your burden silently, PLEASE!

Since you admonish me, let me admonish you:

Do not confuse intellectual rigor with sabotage.

Do not confuse cheerleading with facts.

It seems to me we have been doing entirely too much of both in the last two elections.

[calcowgirl]

I did not suggest that I was addressing my post to anyone other than you. That is why your name was the only one in the "To" box. I also readily admit that I thought you were succumbing to tired tirades of others, with examples of those tirades in quotes.

Now, I could waste a whole lot of white space here and address everyone of your comments, but none of them advance the conversation or are responsive to the questions I orignally asked (or eluded to). Would you care to address any of them?

Beyond that, I apologize if your feelings were hurt by the tone of my posts. It was not intended to be offensive.

[nathanbedford]

I believe that conservatives are individualist and liberals are collectivist. This comes from their eschatology. The conservative thinks his rights are endowed by his creator and the liberal thinks that his rights come to him by virtue of his status. The conservative thinks he is a child of God and the liberal thinks he is God. I think it is the Christian and Jewish tradition to see one's relationship with God as an individual affair, perhaps more so in the Christian tradition where salvation comes one by one and not by virtue of membership in a group.

So when a conservative is confronted with the problem he instinctively seeks to solve it. If his neighborhood is threatened with a series of break-ins he is likely to look to protect his family by keeping a firearm handy in the home. To the liberal, this self-help solution is anathema. He wants you to call 911. The Liberals instinctive reaction to a problem is to invoke the government.

This implies that liberals who see the government as the beginning and ending of everything and who see their relationship to that government as being established by their membership in a group, are naturally group thinkers and group players. They instinctively organize and demonstrate. Let's face it, conservatives are lousy demonstrators. A conservative will cast his vote, he will even write a letter, but he is unlikely to take to the streets. He will sooner move his plant into a friendlier tax base or his family to a better school district.

So when I see anecdotal evidence that a conservative reaction is brewing and that evidence is as flimsy as set forth in this newspaper article, I am naturally skeptical. But that does not mean I am not supportive and not hopeful. Never take counsel of your fears, said Stonewall Jackson. But, equally, one should not deceive himself with false hope.

If you are familiar with my posts here, you will be aware that I predicted the election calamity of 2006 and then again in 2008. Lately I have been saying that the only thing we learned from the election of 2008 is that we learned nothing from the election 2006. Much of what has befallen us has come from sleepwalking and from a unwillingness to face facts and give up false hope. That is not to say that I've taken counsel of my fears. I have posted ad nauseaum about possible tactics and strategies to get us out of the wilderness and save our democracy. Sitting here nursing my new stainless steel knee and my Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software, I have had plenty of time to do just that at very great length.

Just yesterday, I posted four or five lengthy replies suggesting that there was possibly a genuine anxiety abroad in the land which could act as tinder to the proper spark. I stated my idea that it is in the nature of the electorate to suffer passively for long periods of time many outrages from their government and then, often over some seeming triviality, to erupt in righteous indignation and sweep the rascals out. I believe that is the state of the electorate today. I believe there is genuine and well-founded fear in the land. But I don't know that to be a fact. I would not dream or presume to tell the world that it is a fact. I watch the polls but there is no definite indication yet. I see the evidence of the tea parties and my heart beats faster, but we haven't seen any real groundswell yet.

As to my comments about race and Pete Wilson and the immigrants situation in California, please see my reply to gray whiskers. Tip O'Neill's maxim that all politics is local was not really true in American history if the term is taken exclusively in its geographical sense. Politics in America has always been ethnic, religious, and racial. Massachusetts Catholics vote their religion on behalf the Teddy Kennedy. New York Jews vote their religion on behalf of Mayor Koch. African-Americans vote their race on behalf of Barak Obama. That is the principal way the electorate gets sliced and diced by the Democrat party. That explains much of the politics in California today. To deny that reality is to become ineffective in the real world of politics.

The Democrat party has flooded the electorate with people who realize that their voter registration card is really the keys to the treasury. So the Democrats have set up a class warfare in California. Individualistic conservatives, embattled, are trying almost quaintly with tea parties in parking lots, to protect their homes, their incomes, and their businesses from a populism crafted by liberals. So our dilemma as conservatives is that if we win the election this time because we have better ideas, the Democrats will simply flood the field with another wave of immigrant voters for the next election. I can well imagine how embattled you feel in California under these circumstances and would understandably have little patience for someone second-guessing from 8000 miles.

My prayer is that every parking lot in California, indeed every parking lot in America, will be swelled with indignant taxpayers and citizens of all races and classes who will bring our republic back to sanity.