If I can make due on a 20% pay cut....so too can the State and its employees. And it should.

Here's an idea, tax the liberals that want higher taxes and leave the rest of us out of it.

If you then say that doesn't equitably share the burden across those receiving benefits from the State, I ask you to look at how you justify rent control? It does the same thing, only the burden to subsidize renters isn't a choice of property owners.

Why is it always raise taxes or punish the poor? There is another way that no one brings up; punish the banks who built up all the fraud that created all this false debt that threatens to bankrupt California, the US and the World for the next hundred years. Tell those banks that are holding all California's bonds the state assessor has reassessed all property value of the assets the bonds are for and the assets the bonds are for will be 1/3 of their prior value. All a sudden 2/3 of the state's dept disappears and we have a surplus again. The assets where way over valued anyways and this false debt with no security backing it has created the "Bottomless Pit" of over 600 Trillion dollars that threatens the world's economic stability today. See http://www.bis.org/publ/otc_hy0811.pdf?noframes=1 at page 5.

I. Market developments in the first half of 2008
The notional amounts outstanding of over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives continued to expand in the first half of 2008. Notional amounts of all types of OTC contracts stood at $683.7 trillion at the end of June, 15% higher than six months before (Table 1). Multilateral terminations of outstanding contracts resulted in the first ever decline of 1% in the volume of outstanding credit default swaps (CDS) since the first publication of CDS statistics in December 2004. The average growth rate for outstanding CDS contracts over the last three years has been 45%. In contrast to CDS markets, markets for interest rate derivatives and FX derivatives both recorded significant growth. Open positions in interest rate derivatives contracts rose by 17%, while those in FX contracts expanded by 12%. Gross market values, which measure the cost of replacing all existing contracts and are thus a better gauge of market risk than notional amounts, increased by 29% to $20.4 trillion at the end of June 2008.

So my solution to the state budget is to revalue everything, eliminate this false debt, and seal the pit...

Edwardd50 the state's financial problem isn't the fault of the Mexican citizens working in the US this is just discrimination like Arizona has enacted in their so-called "Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act" (known before its enactment as Arizona Senate Bill 1070 or simply Arizona SB 1070) which is a civil rights violation based on national origin, in this case Mexico. Important immigration rights where granted to Mexican citizens under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.

The war between the United States and Mexico ended 162 years ago this past February, but in some sense the struggle has continued by other means. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ceded nearly one-half of Mexico to the United States - 1 million square miles encompassing what are now the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California, most of Colorado, and part of Wyoming. Though the territorial shift was enormous, the treaty itself was temperate. It guaranteed the civil, religious, and property rights of Mexican citizens in the ceded territory. They were presumed to be Americans, at least legally, if they did not leave or register as Mexicans within one year. Article IX declared that the Mexicans in the ceded territories "shall be incorporated into the United States of America, and admitted as soon as possible, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, to the enjoyment of all the rights of citizens of the United States. In the meantime, they shall be maintained and protected in the enjoyment of their liberty and property, and the civil rights now vested in them according to the Mexican laws."

Regarding those Mexican citizens who decide to come to the US for travel or employment opportunities the Treaty states at Article IX “The Mexicans who, in the territories aforesaid, shall not preserve the character of citizens of the Mexican Republic, conformably with what is stipulated in the preceding article, shall be incorporated into the Union of the United States. and be admitted at the proper time (to be judged of by the Congress of the United States) to the enjoyment of all the rights of citizens of the United States, according to the principles of the Constitution; and in the mean time, shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty and property, and secured in the free exercise of their religion without; restriction.” Therefore at a minimum the Arizona SB 1070 violates this provision of the Treaty.

Hola.

Yes, we have problems here in CA but this nation is sinking quickly, in case one hasn't noticed. There's obviously money. We have billion$ to pour down a hole in Iraq, Afghanistan et al and for droning and killing innocent people in Pakistan which has greatly escalated under Mr Change, but we conveniently don't have money for what's needed in this nation.

There's $$$$$$$$$ for giveaways and bail-outs to corporations/banks. There's plenty of $$$$$$$$$ for that. The priorities of this nation are quite fuked up. Did you hear that Detroit is going to destroy 10,000 abandoned homes? (Google it).

If one has done any traveling at all around the world, one notices how superior other nations are to this crumbing one. Granted, the know-nothing, willfully-ignorant rednecks like to scapegoat anyone who doesn't look just like them or speak like them, and what they call "English." They want "everyone" to speak "English," when they can barely speak English themselves...and certainly can't write it. Maybe they should try a second language, since they can't master the first one. Illiterate fools.

Buenas noches.

In a totally corrupt political system like this, with no real choice -- only one of two gangs to choose from, both of whom are beholden to their corporate masters and/or support them otherwise -- you can't realistically expect someone from one of those gangs to openly advocate what you propose, regardless of reality. As the late comedian George Carlin pointed out several years ago, the people who own the country -- or in this case, who own California -- are the ones who make the decisions. Politicians are just there for show and to convince people that they have a choice, when in reality they have little or none.