Flip, I just bought a few accessories for my Rocket in the LA County area today and paid 8.5% sales tax. I paid that tax with money that had already been subject to a 45% income/FICA tax. That’s why I buy most of my stuff online (Pure-Triumph.com or MADSS.com). It’s pretty simple economics but California’s politicians have a large constituency of dependent voters to feed (both legal and illegal).
Arnold gave it his best shot back in 05’ when he tried (but failed) to pass initiatives that would have created limits on state spending and limits on the use of union dues for political purposes. In California, union members have no control over which political party receives millions of their union dues dollars. The common sense initiative would have given union members the right to choose which party (if any) they wished to receive any portion of their dues. The unions spent millions to prevent their members from getting that right. After all, without the money unions contribute to the democratic party, they’d have no control over legislators. Union dues generate the cash flow necessary to exercise that control. The California Teachers Union even mortgaged their office buildings in an effort to prevent the passage of that initiative. The teachers unions have succeeded in equating support for their union with support for the education of our kids. It’s a preposterous connection, but it sells to the masses here on the left coast.
Winston Churchill once said something close to the following, “If you’re eighteen and not a liberal, then you’re without a heart. But if you’re forty and not a conservative, then you’re without a brain”. Will Rogers put it another way. He defined a liberal as “a person who is generous with somebody else’s money”. Michael Savage is a little more direct. He claims liberalism is a mental disorder. I just think it’s stupid.