----- Original Message ----- From: "Jan Coffey" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Killer Bs Discussion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2003 11:31 AM Subject: Re: Oh, BTW: Re: How some conservatives are deliberately destroying America
> > > --- Ronn!Blankenship <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > At 06:37 PM 10/20/03 -0400, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > >http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/20/opinion/20MON3.html > > > > > >Well, I hope you're happy as prisoners are let out early, people die, > > >teachers are fired, > > Guv Rip & co. are the ones making the decision about which programs to cut. > Instead of making wise choices for the state, they are making the choices > which are in their own political and power sustaining, best intrests.
The budget for Alabama is at: http://www.budget.state.al.us/stgovfin.html
It would be interesting for those who claim that there is no problem in cutting the budget by more than a third to show where expenses can be cut, only hurting the political power of the governor.
If you are asking me to provide an alternate budget without raising taxes, I don't have one. People who I know who were against the tax increase knew full well that the cuts would be made in such a way as to take revenge on as many people who voted "No" as possible. The problem in Alabama is that no one can get elected without the support of both the AEA (Alabama Education Association) and its president Paul Hubbard and ALFA (ALabama Farmers Association, I think -- no one ever uses the full name), which owns a large portion of the land, even though the interests of the two often conflict. In this case, the idea of the "reform" part of the tax package was to raise property taxes on large landowners and supposedly give more money to schools, but there was nothing in the package which guaranteed that it would go anywhere specifically, and, as I said in an earlier post, the tax increases would hit the low-income people, too.
We need tax reform, but first we need political power reform. This package didn't provide it. It would have done nothing to change the status quo. Why should they be given more money to do the same thing they have been doing for years?
-- Ronn! :)
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