California politicians bet big

Sacramento Bee ^ | 5/16/12 | Dan Walters

[SmithL]

Poker players often use the phrase "betting on the come" to describe a willingness, if instincts and odds indicate, to wager big on the hope that they will draw winning cards.

That's a perfectly valid tactic when one is playing with one's own money and therefore bearing the risk.

But is it appropriate for California politicians to bet on the come by approving many billions of dollars in spending on very shaky assumptions that the money will be there when it's needed to pay the bills?

Risk was the underlying theme of two hearings in the Capitol on Tuesday.

One dealt with Gov. Jerry Brown's newly revised budget, which assumes that voters will approve new taxes, and the other with the Brown-sponsored bullet train project, which assumes that the federal government will finance completion once it's started.

[Buckeye McFrog]

“Too Big to Fail” is established doctrine.

If you can go to the Congress with a sufficiently distressing Chicken Little story the Pubbies will bend over and give you the money.

We’ve seen this before.

[Grampa Dave]

Brown and his tax and spend chronies are the reason why we have Prop 13.

Like most liberals, spending OPM, our tax dollars, is an incureable mental disorder for any liberals, who get elected to a public office.

[Neanderthal]

Taxes are way too low in California compared to other states. We need to tax the people that work more and give their money to people that don’t. That will fix the problem.

[Robert357]

Dear Gov Brown;

Please tax the rich, especially the filthy conservative rich that are small businessmen.

Please drive them out of your state and into my state. We can used the jobs, tax base and charitable contributions. Since we don't have an income tax, nor the level of governmental regulation found in California, we are likely to get some of them. If nothing else, their purchasing new homes up here would help our housing market recover.

P.S. keep up the job you are doing

(/sarcasm)