Archive for February 6th, 2007
Spitzer’s $120.6 Billion Budget Hikes Spending 3x Inflation Rate
Governor Spitzer unveiled his first budget proposal last week with a claim that the proposal does not include any new taxes. The state-funded portion of Spitzer’s $121 billion Executive Budget, however, calls for a spending hike of 7.8 percent - three times the projected inflation rate for the state’s 2007-08 fiscal year, which begins April 1. According to fiscal estimates, the state will be facing a $2.3 billion budget shortfall next year and $6.3 billion by the end of his first term in 2010-11 if no further changes are made.
The factors driving up Spitzer’s first budget include a $1.4 billion increase in school aid, a $1.5 billion increase in state-subsidized property-tax relief and $1.6 billion in capital projects.
Spitzer’s property tax proposal is a dramatic expansion of the current STAR program that provides $1.5 billion in state tax dollars to subsidize property tax bills (Spitzer targets this state money to the middle class based on income levels). He also included a plan to to increase education funding by $1.4 billion, while directing a larger percentage of that money to downstate schools.
In his address, Spitzer argued all this spending can be done by stopping fraud, closing tax loopholes and reigning in Medicaid costs by cutting the growth rate to just over 1.5 percent - down from 8 percent over the last few years.
Closing loopholes is political speech for increasing business taxes. The last thing we need if we are to see a recharged economy in New York. Some of the loopholes may not be fair, but closing them will just drive more businesses away. If they are to be closed, it should be combined with an overall decrease in spending and taxes.
New York already has the country’s second highest state/local tax rate, the highest business taxes in the country, and among the highest property tax rates. We need less government, not more!
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There has been a lot of talk around the blogosphere about Spitzer, his reform agenda and his willingness to fight with Silver and Bruno. From what I’ve seen so far, he is doing the same thing he did as State Attorney General. He is keeping his name in the headlines to gain favorable publicity. Taken on its face, his actions appear to be laudable. Further examination reveals the stark truth. Below are my comments that I left on another blog.
I still have virtually no faith in Spitzer. His proposed budget with 2,468 new state jobs and a 6.3% spending increase is indefensible. Then you look at the money he wants to throw at public education, $40 million for Buffalo alone. That is like buying a bottle for an alcoholic.
In light of his propensity for government programs and spending to improve things, his reform agenda is meaningless. Whether you have Silver & Bruno’s pork or Spitzer’s version of socialism, it is all government waste.
More money won’t fix a broken system (schools), school choice will without additional funding. Increasing the size of the bureaucracy in a state with an already bloated one is counterproductive. Increasing the government’s stranglehold on health care is only going to further increase the costs.
Our government is top heavy. The only way to fix that is to reduce the size, scope and spending. Government regulations have distorted the real value of services to the extent that costs consume far too much of everyone’s budgets.
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Recently, the phrase “rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic” has been used to describe the American Congress and its “activity” on the questions of Iraq, and by extension, on the question of our imperial presidency.
The Sunday Washington Post features an article on those who warned in 2002 that this all-Bush, all-the-time – yet strangely Clintonesque – adventure in war for democracy, and invasion for humanitarianism would fail miserably. In the article, retired U.S. Generals Bill Odom and Tony Zinni are asked about how they feel knowing they were correct about Iraq, and that no one in Congress, in the administration, or in America listened to them. Now they are asked for their advice on what to do. They give it clearly, and in some detail. They say bring the troops home!
One wonders why this article is delegated to the Style section. We should not. Rearrangement of deck chairs on a sinking ship makes for damn fine news reporting. Particularly when the ship is filled with colorful images of the rich and powerful and the impoverished, desperate, and hopeless – all joined in the same disaster, and most but not all destined for a horrible death.
The problem is, the Titanic would have sunk regardless of the placement of the deck chairs.
Tags: INVASION | humanitarianism | fail | democracy | Washington | Titanic | Politics | Iraq | deck | Congress | chairs
Much like oil and water, power and freedom don’t mix. Our government was designed to protects our freedom and liberties. Instead, we have an ever increasing, power-hungry political state that tells us how to live our lives. Not only are we told how to live, we are forced to support the massive bureaucracy that ensures our compliance by force.
With the elections over and the 110th Congress settling in, the media have been reporting ad nauseam about who has assumed new political power in Washington. We’re subjected to breathless reports about emerging power brokers in Congress; how so-and-so is now the powerful chair of an important committee; how certain candidates are amassing power for the 2008 elections, and so on. Nobody questions this use of the word “power,” or considers its connotations. It’s simply assumed, in Washington and the mainstream media, that political power is proper and inevitable.
The problem is that politicians are not supposed to have power over us – we’re supposed to be free. We seem to have forgotten that freedom means the absence of government coercion. So when politicians and the media celebrate political power, they really are celebrating the power of certain individuals to use coercive state force.
Read it all: Political Power and the Rule of Law by Ron Paul
