Politicians Bankrupted California, Not Prop. 13

Townhall.com ^ | June 29, 2009 | Carol Platt Liebau

[Kaslin]

As the end of California’s fiscal year approaches, the Governor and state legislators confront a $24 billion deficit. While Republicans and Democrats wrangle over how to address the gaping shortfall, some members of the press have started to look for a scapegoat for the fiscal train wreck. Many have blamed the California taxpayer’s only protection: Prop. 13, the 1978 measure capping state property taxes at 1% of a home’s assessed value.

Perhaps the most egregious example of the finger-pointing is a recent piece from TIME’s Kevin O’Leary, moaning that “Before Prop 13, in the 1950s and '60s, California was a liberal showcase.” He insists that “at the root of California's misery lies Proposition 13,” and concludes that “in California, the conservative legacy lives on.”

[Carley]

SPENDING SPENDING SPENDING

[Califreak]

Judicial interference in Prop 187

[TheDon]

Thank goodness for Prop 13, or things in Ca would be much, much worse.

[kellynla]

ping

[Jim Noble]

Yes, the politicians did it - but they did what the people wanted, there's no doubt about it.

This is why California is such a harbinger of regime crisis - the "Reagan settlement" is failing. The People have chosen high spending and low taxes, and no electoral politician, of either faction, can survive telling the people that they can't have everything they want.

California is the first, but not unfortunately the last, casualty of "democracy".

It's not the politicians, nor the MSM, nor the illegals that killed California and will soon kill the USA - it's universal franchise voting combined with lack of virtue and prudence in the hearts of the people.