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Thread: Get Back To The Chopper.

  1. #26
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    I've got to find the article....but a city right next to them has got some work to do because of this.

    This city got rid of all of its public workers....laid them all off, police force and everything and outsourced the work to private industry or other neighboring cities... big savings...

    Some of the work was outsourced to Bell.

  2. #27
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Quote Originally Posted by Theophilus View Post
    I enjoy listening to the John and Ken show on KFI, those guys are good. I was looking for more info about this story, and I must of come across the same article you did or one similar about the voter fraud.

    Former Bell police officer alleges serious voting irregularities in 2009 election - latimes.com

    I missed that show with John and Ken, though it had to be a very good show.

    I am wondering just how far this goes.

    This is just horrible beyond belief.
    Well the latest is more of just the tip of the ice berg. They have discovered that the men whoo hired the locksmith and opened the office andf took computer hard drives and boxes of files and paperworks for a team of forensic auditors hired by the city of Bell no less! They have hired attorneys because they know they are getting their asses sued soon. The news interm City manager admitted this today. Can you believe this crap? They are trying to hide evidence and cover their butts.

    It gets better. They have moved all the workers in the City Hall of Bell over next door to the City Hall at Maywood to try and dodge reporters and protesting citizens. lmao

    It has now been discovered by the L.A. Times and who knows who...that several other bell City officials were getting salaries of over 400 grand a year. Hopefully their names will be released soon.

    And other cities in L.A. are up in arms because they will be stuck footing a large part these ridiculous pensions to these crooks as well.

    Plus from the Times: "City Managers will gather in Sacramento on Thursday to discuss damage control. Some say more residents are seeking salary information from city halls. The Legislature considers reforms as well. Among the ideas on the table: launching an independent examination of city officials' salaries and compiling a database of salaries for municipal executives.

    The Legislature also is mulling several Bell-inspired proposals, including a requirement that cities make salaries easily accessible on websites. Another suggestion would cap pensions of highly paid city officials, an issue that arose after The Times reported that former Bell City Manager Robert Rizzo, who earned nearly $800,000 a year, would receive roughly $600,000 a year in pension benefits once he retired.

    Many of the ideas are designed to put political distance between Bell and the rest of California's 480 cities and towns. "It would be really unfortunate if anyone took the outrageous action of one city and generalized it to all cities," said Chris McKenzie, executive director of the League of California Cities, which is hosting the meeting.

    The stories of soaring salaries come at a difficult time for cities, which are making cutbacks amid a recession that has made many taxpayers ever more interested in what services they get for their tax dollars.

    In Sacramento, the Bell salary controversy threatens to undermine the arguments made by city managers against state budget proposals that would take money away from municipalities. For months, city officials have lobbied the Legislature, arguing that they are suffering financially because of the economic slump and cannot afford deeper cuts.

    "However, the Times story suggests this duress may not apply to all our cities, or that some cities are not allowing their economic plight to curtail Fortune 500-level salaries for their senior executives,'' State Senate President Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) wrote in a pointed letter to the League of Cities last week.

    At a time of low public confidence in government, the Bell revelations pose another threat to the credibility of local officials.

    "It just makes for a toxic environment," said Max Neiman, senior resident scholar at the Institute of Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley.

    City clerks, human resource directors and finance officers said they have been processing an influx of public records requests for public officials' salary figures since the revelations of the salary paid to Rizzo as well as Bell's police chief, who made $457,000, and the assistant city manager, who made $376,000.

    Officials have found themselves repeating the mantra, "We're not Bell," to concerned residents.

    Figuring out exactly how much top city leaders make can be difficult, however. The base salary of city officials is usually the most easily accessible number, but it rarely captures the total compensation. City leaders also can be paid through car and phone allowances, housing agreements or deferred compensation plans. In some cases, city managers can receive a separate salary by holding a different position or serving on a board or commission.

    Those extras can significantly boost total compensation, but they are difficult to sort out.

    Take the case of Laguna Hills. Barbara Kogerman, who ran for City Council in the Orange County suburb, sought the assistance of three local graduate students to figure out how much City Manager Bruce Channing earned and how his pay compared to that of other Orange County city managers.

    Collecting the information was difficult, in part because each city offered data in a unique format, the students said.

    In the case of Laguna Hills, the students said Channing received a base salary of $233,430 but calculated his total earnings at $460,809 after including $227,379 in additional payments.

    Channing strongly disputed the report, calling it "factually inaccurate and misleading" because it included what he said were reimbursements for phone bills, travel costs and other expenses.

    "What it costs an organization to equip an individual to perform their duties is not the same as the salary that the individual is paid," Channing said.

    The Internal Revenue Service has rules designed to distinguish between legitimate reimbursements for business expenses and disguised forms of compensation, but applying those rules to individual cases can be tricky.

    Channing, the vice president of the League of California Cities' City Managers Department, plans to attend the meetings today in Sacramento and said action is needed in the wake of the Bell revelations.

    Making total compensation figures easier to look up is one of several items on the agenda in Sacramento.

    Assemblyman Hector De La Torre (D- South Gate) said legislation he is working on may go beyond requiring public disclosure to also restrict how compensation and pensions are provided.

    "We're looking at how you can limit aspects of contracts that are completely out of whack with prevailing practices, including salaries,'' De La Torre said, calling Bell's compensation "ridiculous."

    He also has consulted with the California Public Employees Retirement System on possible legislation to limit cities' ability to award excessive pensions, the cost of which must be borne by all government agencies paying into the system.

    As The Times has reviewed city manager salaries, it has found a few officials who have actually taken pay cuts during the tough financial times.

    For instance, the city managers of Signal Hill, Santa Fe Springs and Redondo Beach reduced their pay or declined merit bonuses, as did the entire city staff of Bellflower

    "To see people doing what they've apparently done in Bell offends me on a personal level," said Bellflower Assistant City Manager Leo Mingle. "It's obscene."

  3. #28
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    here is more...these poor people have just been raped and pillaged:

    Homes of the same value in richer cities are taxed at a much lower rate, county tax records show. Residents are already angry about excessive salaries paid to officials.

    The small working-class city of Bell not only paid officials the highest salaries in the state: Residents also pay the highest property tax rates of all but one of Los Angeles County's 88 cities, county tax records show.

    The records appear to confirm complaints by Bell residents who have expressed outrage that they seemed to be paying excessive taxes at the same time the city was paying its top administrator nearly $800,000 and council members were paying themselves nearly $100,000.

    "They're robbing us of our money," said Juan Madrid, 64, who has owned his tidy yellow home with peach trim on Walker Avenue for about 30 years

    Like other residents of this largely immigrant city of about 39,000, he has watched as his property taxes have climbed in the last few years while the value of his home has slumped.

    All county property owners pay 1% general property tax, along with special or direct assessments levied by their municipalities. The countywide average of all tax rates is 1.16%, or $11.60 for every $1,000 of assessed value.

    The rate in Bell is 1.55%.

    That means the owner of a home in Bell with an assessed value of $400,000 pays about $6,200 in annual property taxes. The owner of the same house in Malibu, whose rate is 1.10%, would pay just $4,400.

    Bell's property tax rate is nearly 50% greater than those in such affluent enclaves as Beverly Hills, Palos Verdes Estates and Manhattan Beach, and significantly higher than just about everywhere else in the county, according to records provided by the county auditor-controller's office at The Times' request.

    The only place with a higher rate than Bell's is the City of Industry — but it has only 21 residential parcels that are affected. Bell has 2,065 single-family homes and 1,568 residential rentals, according to city documents, which include 522 commercial-industrial properties in a total assessed valuation of $1.4 billion.

    The Times reported earlier this week that the city had cut spending on police and community services, even as it continued to raise salaries for City Manager Robert Rizzo, Assistant City Manager Angela Spaccia and Police Chief Randy Adams to some of the highest in the nation.

    Rizzo was paid $787,637 a year, Adams' salary was $457,000 and Spaccia's was $376,000. All three resigned amid public uproar after The Times reported the amounts earlier this month.

    Their salaries and Bell's hefty property taxes contrast sharply with city residents' financial standing. Median household income in Bell, just southeast of Los Angeles, is $40,556 — well below the countywide average of $57,152.

    The city's tax rate is due to a combination of factors, records show: among them, bond debt for municipal improvements such as a sports complex now under construction and a "retirement tax" approved by local voters in 1944 that put property owners on the hook for some of the cost of municipal employees' pensions.

    Since 2006, county records show, those local taxes have doubled. So have direct assessments for trash collection, sewer maintenance and other services.

    In 2005, Bell voters approved a measure that adopted a City Charter, a move that allowed council members to get around state limits on their salaries. It is unclear what bearing, if any, that had on raising property taxes.

    Revenue from the tax increases went to designated funds or services and did not directly pay for administrators' salaries. But by freeing money from the city's general fund, the higher taxes appear to have made the outsized salaries more feasible for the small city.

    For at least 20 years before 2007, the retirement tax — formally known as a Post-retirement Benefits Fund-Pension Obligation — had stayed at the same rate of 0.187%.

    In 2007, two years after the city issued nearly $10 million in bonds to finance a loan to cover its unfunded pension liability, the City Council passed a resolution calling for a series of hikes over the next three years. The current rate is 0.277%, or half again what it was three years ago.

    The council also passed a resolution that year nearly doubling assessments for services including refuse collection, which went from $14.71 a month for a single-family residence to $26.48 a month.

    And this year, a 0.09% assessment kicked in to cover the $15-million debt on a sports complex that is planned to include a soccer field, baseball stadium and a gym at a projected cost of $10 million to $15 million, as well as other improvements including a library and performing arts center. Taxpayers' assessments for the improvements, which voters approved several years ago, will increase over the next two years, records show.

    And that's not all.

    The city's most recent comprehensive annual financial report, for the fiscal year ended June 2009, suggests the retirement tax will continue to go up. It says Bell has thus far "opted to assess below the authorized amount" it can assess to pay for pensions.

    "In the future, the City intends to gradually increase the tax levy to the full amount required to meet the City's pension costs," according to the report, which noted that the city's general fund now loans money to the retirement fund to cover costs.

    The Times has previously reported that Rizzo could become the state's highest-paid pensioner, receiving an annual benefit of roughly $600,000.

    His two colleagues also appear to be in line for large pensions, although the state's pension board has said no benefits will be paid until investigations into Bell's actions are completed.

    Even as their bills grew , many in town thought they were in the same tax boat as property owners elsewhere.

    "I didn't realize we were so unique here in this little community," said Dorothy Danna, 68, a widow who has lived in Bell for 40 years and is losing her home to foreclosure. "I thought everyone paid as much as we did. . . . That does not make me very happy."

    Danna's total property tax bill rose from about $3,000 in 2005 to about $4,000 this year, while the assessed value during that time has grown at a significantly smaller rate.

    She blames her foreclosure more on an ill-advised adjustable-rate refinancing than on the unpaid back taxes that have piled up with her delinquent house payments.

    But it still makes her see red to think she was footing so much of the bill for a city government that lavished money on the people who were supposed to be running it wisely.

    "I sure hope they all get what they deserve," she said.

  4. #29
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    The Police Chief of Bell, who is already going to be investigated for his part in this fiasco now has this added to his problems, the *******:

    Glendale has joined two other cities in trying to block what could be hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional pension payments for Randy Adams, whose lucrative stint as police chief of Bell continues to have far-reaching consequences via the state's complicated employee retirement system.

    Adams, who worked for the police departments in Simi Valley and Ventura before coming to Glendale, was forced to step down last week as police chief of Bell amid growing outcry over his $457,000 salary in a relatively poor city of about 40,000 people.

    City officials at first believed that the $457,000 salary Adams received in Bell would not increase the money they paid to the state employee retirement system, or CalPERS, for his five years in Glendale. But a review by Glendale's state pension actuary determined that Adams' brief stint in Bell will cost Glendale taxpayers between $500,000 and $600,000 in additional benefits, or about $40,000 a year for the length of his retirement.

    City officials in Simi Valley and Ventura also said they expect to take a substantial hit.

    Simi Valley City Manager Mike Sedell said he believes his city will be on the hook for between $35,000 and $40,000 more each year than it would have if Adams had retired from Glendale, where he earned roughly $215,000 a year.

    Ventura City Manager Rick Cole said he thinks his city will be forced to pay even more because Adams worked there for roughly 20 years. Cole declined to put a dollar figure on the expected cost.

    All three officials said they have yet to get a detailed picture from CalPERS on the impact of Adams' revised retirement costs.

    Sedell, the city manager at Simi Valley, said cities set aside retirement money for each qualified employee based on CalPERS formulas for how much the person is expected to receive in retirement benefits. The formulas determine how much money will come from CalPERS investments and how much is required from employers throughout the worker's career.

    The final retirement payout is based on the year of highest earnings. When those earnings jump at the end of a career, it renders the prior retirement payouts short of what is needed.

    "If that highest-year pay exceeds what PERS assumes, it can be a big cost bite," said Glendale City Manager Jim Starbird.

    On Monday, Starbird sent a letter to California Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown, asking him to investigate the matter.

    "We actively support and encourage your seeking a full investigation as to not only the circumstances surrounding the payment of the significant salary, which now adds to the financial obligations of Glendale, but whether there is any legal basis to set aside the salary or a portion of the benefit based thereon," Starbird wrote in the letter to Brown.

    Ventura and Simi Valley joined the request.

    "This is so patently an abuse of the retirement system that our cities are moving quickly to make sure it is an abuse that does not burden our cities or our budgets," Cole said.

    In his 20 years in Ventura, Adams rose to the rank of assistant chief, before leaving to become police chief in Simi Valley.

    He then came to Glendale, during which time he applied for the appointment to interim Orange County sheriff. After being eliminated from consideration there, he soon announced his intent to retire, but then Bell made an offer that at the time he declined to disclose.

    A Los Angeles Times investigation earlier this month revealed his salary to be $457,000.

    Adams, along with Bell City Manager Robert Rizzo and Assistant City Manager Angela Spaccia, resigned last week as outcry grew over their salaries. Rizzo was earning nearly $800,000 a year.

    Adams' estimated pension payout is about $400,000 — or roughly double what he would have received before spending a year in Bell, CalPERS spokesman Edward Fong said.

    It could take up to two weeks for the results of CalPERS' own probe into whether the salary and resulting pension hike fall within state regulations, Fong added.

    "We want what's fair for retirees and for taxpayers," Cole said. "This is an outrageous example of unfairness, and I think all three cities are inclined to ensure that fairness prevails in the end. We will not allow abuses elsewhere to impact our taxpayers here.

  5. #30
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Today, Downey cut it's ties, that is fired the law team that is representing the City of Bell and who took the records out of the office. lmao

    A divided City Council voted 3-2 Thursday to terminate its contract with law firm Best Best & Krieger, which is representing the city of Bell through its current turmoil.

    Council members who voted for termination of the contract praised lead counsel Ed Lee but said they were concerned of "guilt by association."

    Lee, of the Best Best & Krieger law firm, has served as Downey's city attorney since 2007.

    According to the city of Downey's contract with Best Best & Krieger, the law firm may be terminated "at any time and without cause" with 30 days notice.

    Lee was not available for comment after the meeting.

    Good for them!

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Rizzo Among 8 Arrested in Bell Scandal

    Updated: Tuesday, 21 Sep 2010, 6:26 PM PDT

    Published : Tuesday, 21 Sep 2010, 10:11 AM PDT
    Posted by: Dennis Lovelace, Tony Spearman / myFOXla.com
    Bell - The mayor and former city manager of Bell were led away in handcuffs Tuesday, charged with six other officials with taking more than $5.5 million from the working-class suburb in a scandal that triggered nationwide outrage and calls for more transparency in government.

    Former City Manager Robert Rizzo, Mayor Oscar Hernandez and the other current and former city officials were rounded up during morning raids on their homes that prompted many of their neighbors to burst into cheers.

    They were charged with dozens of counts of illegally paying themselves huge salaries in what District Attorney Steve Cooley called a case of "corruption on steroids."
    "They used the taxes of the hardworking citizens of Bell as their own piggy bank, which they looted," Cooley told a news conference as he stood next to photos of the eight suspects.
    In Bell, where one in six residents lives in poverty, people began honking their horns at the news of the arrests. At City Hall, dozens gathered to laugh and applaud as someone played the Queen song "Another One Bites the Dust."

    "I got so excited that, oh my God, I couldn't breathe," said Violeta Alvarez, a 31-year resident. "I'm excited. I'm happy. I have tears of joy in my eyes."
    Rizzo, who was making nearly $800,000 a year, was booked on 53 counts of misappropriation of public funds and conflict of interest. Messages left at his home and with his attorney were not returned.
    He and the others were scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday, with officials seeking bail amounts ranging from $3.2 million for Rizzo to $130,000 for former Councilman George Cole. The amounts were based on how much authorities believe each person took.

    Others taken into custody were former assistant city manager Angela Spaccia, Vice Mayor Teresa Jacobo, council members George Mirabal and Luis Artiga and former council member Victor Bello.
    Spaccia was making $376,288, and four of the five City Council members were paying themselves nearly $100,000 a year.
    "I seen them take out Mirabal in handcuffs," longtime resident Hassan Mourad said after the arrests. "I seen them drag him out."
    At the mayor's house, police briefly used a battering ram when Hernandez didn't immediately come to the door.
    Former Police Chief Randy Adams, who was also scrutinized in the salary scandal, was not arrested.
    Cooley, who knew Adams when he was the police chief in Glendale, said there was no evidence Adams illegally obtained his $457,000 annual salary. The figure was $150,000 more than the Los Angeles chief of police gets paid.

    "Being paid excessive salaries is not a crime," Cooley said. "Illegally obtaining those salaries is a crime."
    Authorities said Rizzo made $4.3 million by paying himself through different employment contracts that were not approved by the City Council.

    Meanwhile, council members paid themselves a combined $1.25 million for what Cooley called "phantom meetings" of various city boards and agencies.
    Rizzo also was accused of giving $1.9 million in loans to himself, Spaccia, Hernandez, Artiga and dozens of others.
    Cooley said his investigators have pored over more than 60,000 pages of documents and more people could be arrested.
    His office began investigating last March, Cooley said, four months before the Los Angeles Times reported the salaries, which brought national attention to the small city of 40,000 people.
    Since the scandal broke, public officials, city managers and others have said the situation in Bell showed why people must insist that elected officials communicate honestly and openly with them.
    "One of the problems that was obvious with Bell was the lack of transparency and the lack of involvement on the part of the public," Dave Mora, West Coast regional director of the International City/County Management Association, said recently.

    Cooley praised the Times, saying the scandal occurred in part because residents and much of the news media paid little attention to what was happening at Bell City Hall until the story broke.
    Rizzo, Adams and Spaccia resigned and the council members reduced their salaries to about $8,000 following the disclosures.
    The four council members, who are currently the target of a recall, would be forced to resign their positions if convicted, Cooley said.
    Bell's interim chief administrative officer Pedro Carrillo said the arrests marked a sad day for the city.
    "It is clear that Rizzo and Spaccia were at the root of the cancer that has afflicted the city," he said.
    Interim City Attorney Jamie Casso said he expected Bell could carry on business as usual, adding that Carrillo and Lorenzo Velez -- the one council member who wasn't arrested -- were meeting regularly. Velez was not taking a high salary.

    The district attorney's office is one of several agencies investigating Bell.
    Last week, Attorney General Jerry Brown sued eight current and former officials of Bell, accusing them of defrauding taxpayers by granting themselves salaries he said were far higher than warranted for the jobs
    they were doing.

    Artiga was not named in the lawsuit but Adams was.
    Earlier this month Bell officials confirmed the city was also the target of a racial profiling investigation by the federal government for allegedly targeting young Hispanic drivers for traffic stops to raise revenue.
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  7. #32
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Nice.

    It's good to see the news of the arrests has even made the headlines Downunder.

    Maybe, just maybe, it might just discourage a few of those others with their snouts on the public trough.
    The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Wow, this is great news, hopefuly it'll be a serious eye opener to other corrupt city governments across the counrty.
    "Never judge a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes...
    Because then it doesn't matter, you’re a mile away and you have his shoes!"

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Just so you know the Get Back to the Chopper thread is about all things Californian.

    I did not clarify that in the beginning, so I will do that now.

    All things Californian are allowed in this thread.

    I found a link about the wasteful spending in California, and some wonder why we are broke.

    Link follows..................

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  10. #35
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Wow!! What a terrific article!!! Mind boggling and eye opening. Our politicians are nothing but feeble-minded, greedy, inefficient, self serving, incompetent, greedy, lying, worthless, out of touch, bozos. And those are their good qualities.

    When Brown stood up and made his speech after being elected, basically stating that he was clueless and hapless to resolve our state's deficit and budget issues/crisis and that he welcomed any suggestions, I thought I was dreaming. I almost fell outta my chair. Why did he bother to run if he had no plan whatsover and no idea about what to do? What the hell kind of leader is that? I thought, oh brother, just shoot me now. So, he wants to keep the dozens of temp taxes that were imposed upon us five years ago? That will certainly make people go out and spend and stimulate our hapless economy! They had all these millions and millions of our hard earned dollars for five damn years and it did not make even one tiny infantesimal dent in the deficit and they simply spent and pissed it all away. Now he wants more? Are you kidding me? He wants to give illegals paid college tuitions when legal citizens are struggling to get their kids through high school. This idiot couln't run a Taco Bell franchise, let alone the State of California.

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Quote Originally Posted by A Life Aloft View Post
    This idiot couln't run a Taco Bell franchise, let alone the State of California.
    Now, now, now. At least he put a sizable dent in YTB. After he did his thing, they went downhill fast.

    As for your other remarks, pretty much agree but still would rather have him than Smeg Whitman.
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Quote Originally Posted by Unsaved Trash View Post
    Now, now, now. At least he put a sizable dent in YTB. After he did his thing, they went downhill fast.

    As for your other remarks, pretty much agree but still would rather have him than Smeg Whitman.
    Oh hell, I in no way wanted either one of them, believe me. She was a liar and a phony. This is what seems to be happening for years now for me. I rarely get a candidate on any level of government that I can really get behind and that I want to win. It's either the lesser of two evils choice - you don't really want either one of them- or you don't vote for any of them, or for some guy that I am behind that I know doesn't have a rats ass chance of getting elected. I wrote my damn dog in for Governor this last go around. He'd be just as effective and much cheaper in the long run.

    Problem is what happened to the AG in ILL or all the other debts and suits? Those bastards are still in business and still making some money. Lloyd, Kimmy and Snotty have gotten away with so much fraud over the years, made so many millions that they have stashed, lived like kings, that in reality, it's sickening. He didn't nail them for nearly as much as I hoped for either. I wanted jail time and the Feds brought in and them completely shut down. THAT would have made me happy.

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Mr. Brown, here's a suggestion for you.....

    Raising taxes is the very thing the state shouldn't be doing. The current shortfall, has already exposed the California's dangerous reliance on high income tax rates on the state's top earners to meet its budgetary needs. Our state's top marginal personal income tax rate is one of the highest in the country already, and its corporate tax rate is among the highest. DO NOT raise taxes even further. What's really needed, in addition to other reforms, is an effort to foster a better business climate in California by reducing corporate taxes, regulations and red tape that are now strangling existing business enterprises and keeping new ones from starting up. Clean up your own house Mr. Brown and cut the waste from within before you look to the already over burdoned taxpayers for addtional help.

  14. #39
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Latest and not so greatest..........

    California Gov. Jerry Brown, fresh from the Bay Area Council's endorsement Friday, took on Americans for Tax Reform head Grover Norquist, calling him "highly undemocratic" for trying to dissuade Republicans from supporting his special election and budget proposals.

    Brown's comments came days after Norquist, in a phone call to us this week, dismissed Brown's special election efforts as "pathetic." The conservative activist threatened to come out to California to do "whatever is necessary" to keep Republicans from signing on to Brown's plan; he says it would be a violation of ATR's "no tax" pledge.

    Brown's response: "I did not take a pledge denying the people the right to vote."

    Oh please, we did vote. The citizens have voted three times and taken to the street while Arnold was The Governator and threatened to raise our taxes yet again. Did you miss that part, Jerry?? Here is an idea. Why not pass a state law that every worker in the state must have pension and medical benefits that are at least as good as those for unionized state govt workers and teachers in this state.
    Maybe we could also pass a law that $100,000 / year is the new minimum wage. Why don't you take the initiative and lower your own pay scale, lower your benefits package, and buy your own health care insurance?

    "He's pathetic himself...and highly undemocratic,'' said the governor of Norquist. He predicted Californians will reject Norquist as an "outsider" from Washington D.C. who's trying to "dictate" politics and policy to Californians.

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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Brown is the wrong person at the wrong time to be governor, well pretty much at anytime IMO. I agree with ALA's post #38. Governor nutzo cannot possibly force the taxpayers to pay more in taxes, when it is obvious that so much spending on worthless and outdated and unnecessary bureaucracy could easily be cut without affecting the residents of California at all.

    One thing that will be a game changer for California and the US is $5.00 a gallon for petrol. No one is going to stand for a tax increase when it will costs $100.00 to fill up your tank. When the government starts talking of a tax increase, people who never really cared about government spending will start looking at what the government is spending money on.

    They will say, they are spending our money on what?!

    I have noticed that all bureaucracies created and the bureaucrats who work for them, think the people cannot live without them.

    I know this is off topic............

    When Clinton was president he decided to actually cut some bureaucracies. One department he cut was one that tasted tea, yes we actually had tea tasters on the government payroll.

    When the pudgy fat fu*k who was obviously lacking vitamin D, who was the head of this worthless bureaucracy came out to address the press.........

    He went on and on about how important his job was, he was so sad.

    I thought, go out and get a real job you jerk.

  16. #41
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Quote Originally Posted by Theophilus
    I have noticed that all bureaucracies created and the bureaucrats who work for them, think the people cannot live without them.
    Isn't that the very heart of the whole argument ??

    IM(very)HO, anyone who thinks for one second the solution to ANY of the problems facing society at ANY level lies with politicians and/or bureaucrats is deluding themselves.

    Things may have evolved in such a way we are "stuck" with the system, politicians and bureaucracy we have, but that does not mean any of them are capable of dealing effectively with the problems society faces.

    In Western "Democracy", for example, at a fundamental level, voters really have only 2 or 3 options when they vote and the "bureaucracy" changes only superficially, if at all.

    In reality any democratic vote comes down to choosing the lesser of 2 evils and NOT the best/most talented/ethical person for the job.
    The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing

  17. #42
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    Yep, it really sucks that we as Americans really try to make changes and nothing changes.

  18. #43
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    I am going to share a post I found. I did not write this, this post is very clever and funny though.


    Lawrence Livermore Laboratories in the US has discovered the heaviest element yet known to science.

    The new element, Governmentium (Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.

    These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.

    Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert; however, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.

    Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2-5 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganisation in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.

    In fact, Governmentium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganisation will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

    This characteristic of morons promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical morass.

    When catalysed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons.

  19. #44
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    Re: Get Back To The Chopper.

    I love it! "When catalysed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons. "

    And the government wonders why people are angry, frustrated, fed up, formed the Tea Party, take to the streets and the internet in droves. People have have it! The government longed ago ceased to serve it's citizens and now only serves itself! It has now become a burdon, inefficient, and destructive to the people’s life, liberty, property and privacy! "The Federal Government shall not operate outside of a balanced budget, nor shall it raise taxes outside of the full participatory legislative process." Yeah right! What happened to that part of the Constitution?

    The purpose of the U.S. Government is supposed to be to protect its citizens from those who would rob them of their life, liberty, privacy, or property either by force or by stealth. Therefore, the government is to protect citizens from entities foreign and domestic, including individuals and institutions who would rob citizens through fraudulent business practices. Now they are the entity themselves who is, robbing us, binding us, restricting us, deceiving us and taking away our freedoms! We now need protection from our own damn goverment! lol Seriously, this crap just makes me crazy!

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