Arnold's feeling wonderful about the "great, great accomplishment" of a state budget that basically cuts education and social spending off at the thighs has passed in California.
Cuts, cuts, and more cuts -- and of course, no new taxes. Brilliant republican money policy that's worked so well in our country in the last decade!
A while back, I heard Arnold say that there was too much "fat" in their budget, and the legislators knew where it was. So let's look at the "fat" they cut:
Public education: $4.3 billion in direct cuts and another $1.7 billion in deferrals
Higher education: $3 billion in cuts
CalWorks: $528 million in cuts
Home health aides: $226 million in cuts
Medi-Cal: $1 billion in cuts
State workers: 13.8% total pay cut (in unpaid work furloughs)
Local-level governments: $4 billion in total cuts
According to the article cited above, "There are no new taxes here unless you count fee hikes to college students, pay cuts to state workers, and benefit cuts to millions who rely on state benefits new taxes. Rejected was a $1.50 per pack tax on cigarettes. Another item rejected was a $15 annual vehicle license fee hike. And the big one that has been rejected is the 9.9% tax on oil extraction that would have given around $1 billion to higher education and could have offset some of the cuts there."
Brilliant republican governance at work!
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But hey, prisons went relatively unscathed! Good to know that they're investing in the future... just what that future might look like, however, is beginning to sound a little like a certain movie that starred the Governator -- in which a few rebels fought against killing machines....