The state of California still cannot get a balanced budget and despite some obvious solutions, the state is held hostage by its unions and their demands for exorbitant retirement benefits. In my book “Straight Talk From a blogger”, I discuss a solution: Convert every participant in defined plans to a 401(K) defined contribution plan. The unions do not want to discuss this possibility. The other critical issue facing California is the problem of farmers growing real food and having to compete with fish that are not edible and on top of that, court ordered pumping restrictions protecting the delta smelt is now recommending further restrictions to help the delta longfin smelt, a relative of the delta smelt.

      I heard an interesting reading from the Old Testament in church several weeks ago and would like to quote from Genesis 1:20-2:4: ”Then God said let us make man in our image after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea. Be fertile and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, birds of the air and all living things that move on the earth”. Maybe our judges and environmentalists should read this. Now the fish have dominion over us.

      Obama’s “stimulus plan is a huge barrel of “pork” and it is tragic that nothing is done on how to increase our oil production by keeping open our off-shore drilling endeavors. Instead the Democrats want to shut down attempts to increase our oil production. By opening up these areas, real jobs could be created by private industry- not government jobs. Obama is following the Hoover-Roosevelt approach. No tax reductions, throw money at the economy with little impact on job creation. Lowering corporate rates and lowering the tax rate on companies bringing home earnings from overseas companies that would then spend these funds in the U.S. None of these ideas have been considered. When I see pictures of Charles Rangel, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Shumer, Harry Reid, Chris Dodd and Barney Frank smiling in regard to the passage of the “Stimulus Bill,I can only laugh at the record of these incapable representatives and how they avoided liability with the recent debacle. Then there is the absolute belief in “climate” change by Obama and the Democrats which could totally bankrupt our economy if carried out. Now that Iraq is settling down, I haven’t heard Harry Reid mentioning his comment that “the war is lost” nor Obama’s theory that Iraq was the wrong spot to send troops but rather Afghanistan and Pakistan were the correct targets. Obama and the Democrats still want Bush’s 2003 tax cuts on capital gains and dividends to expire in 2010. Despite empirical evidence and the Laffer curve that proves lowering these taxes does not lower government revenues but on the contrary government revenues actually increase. This is what happened with JFK and his tax cuts, Reagan and the George W. Bush tax reductions. What does it take to convince these economic illiterates that tax cuts do stimulate our economy?

Gary E. Marsella

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