Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Teabagging


Do you like teabagging?

13 comments:

  1. Yes, I do like balls in my mouth!

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  2. We all need a tax revolt, it begins with our city, county, pensions which are unsustainable. Lane King EUSD retiring with full pay $200k for life? After a miserable few years here? This affects too many children, it's unsustainable !

    But don't be fooled, the new term 'socalism' for liberals, the real socialist are conservatives, giving the shop away to their private corporate friends: oil, energy, war, bomb makers, Halliburton reconstructionist, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan.... and now blaming Obama.

    Tea Bagging is more hoodwinking, distracting the stupid, like the religious right, getting the sheep to vote against themselves.

    The middle class was becoming sustainable, so Bush and the power elite pulled the financial plug, GO Back to GO ! And the last remaining conservatives will be at the city level, let us level them !
    Can you say Bonds, Stock, Dalager ?

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  3. From today's paper: "Today, Sanders will ask the City Council to impose the cuts, as part of an overall plan to close a $60 million deficit in a $3 billion budget.
    Specifically, Sanders is asking each of the city's roughly 10,600 employees to accept a 6 percent reduction in compensation through pay cuts and reduced benefits."

    Why can't our council do the same?

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  4. 30 years ago the state sales tax was 5.5% & the state was fine Now it is 8.5% & the state is broke! I think that is about a 50% increase

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  5. Are these wingnuts really this thick? Someone should hit them with a clue by four.

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  6. to Anon at 12:21
    Lean King is retiring after 40 stellar years in public education. Like all CA public school educators, with each position he served his retirement accumulated in the State Teacher's Retirement System. BTW, during the 4 years he's been with EUSD the district is 6th in the county (out of 42)for student achievement---pretty miserable, huh?

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  7. 40 years big deal. He was compensated well along the way. The public pension system is way out of wack and unsustainable.

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  8. The majority of those retiring from public sector employment (I can't call it work as that would be an insult to real working people) will receive many times more that they ever paid in to their retirement. Plus it is guaranteed by us, the taxpayer who never asked for this burden.

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  9. I've worked 29 years in private industry. My company eliminated their contribution to my 401K retirement plan this year (I am now the only one contributing to my retiirement) and we just suffered a 10% across the board pay cut. We also had a 10% reduction in force at the end of 2008. I'm making less than I made 8 years ago. Other companies, large and small, in manufacturing and high tech are taking similar actions.

    Why shouldn't City, County, State and Federal employees be required to cut costs similarly? They're revenues have fallen just as much as my company's yet there isn't an equivalent cost-cutting mechanism for government. IMHO there should be. Perhaps it is time for an ammendment to our City's General Plan, the State's Constitution and our Country's Constitution.

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  10. Lean King is MISERABLE because of the way he treats people, mainly the parents of the children made to 'learn' how to stand in line properly so they too can one day bend0ver to authority, and turn their pay checks over for more unfair madness called public education, too apathetic to vote...

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  11. Too many have bought the myth that private is superior to public management. But, it is clear that when shareholder profits are the only goal, the entire workforce (with the exception of top management) must continually take a back seat. This experiment is an utter failure with the invisible hand in the mythical free market giving us the finger.

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  12. Our taxes have gotten out of hand,especially in the Golden State. Unlike publicly held corporations, which must inform their shareholders annually of how their investments are being spent, our many levels of governement have almost zero accountability to taxpayers.

    Each and every taxpayer should receive an annual report from each level of government which informs us on incoming income and outflow and a five year projection of the same. Only then can we really make decisions about whether we choose to pay more taxes. In Encinitas, we should see both the county and the city's finances as well as those of the school ditricts. Yes, I know that there are websites with this info (try plowing through the county's finances!), but something along the lines of the simple pie chart provided by the DMV with your vehicle registration would probably be adequate and more readily understood.

    Just look at the postings on this blog about salaries. What perentage of EUSD's budget is salaries and retirement? I don't know, but I do know that focusing on one individual's retirement package isn't going to solve a problem. If 90% of the EUSD's budget is going to salaries/retirement, then we have a very serious problem that we need to address.

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  13. Empty pockets, I think this would be an excellent item to suggest as an agenda item for city council. Let it be a kind of sunshine workshop where citizens get to see in simple terms where the money is raised and where it is spent. I say workshop because an informal session with public questions and more opportunity for a back and forth discussion of where our money goes is needed. And, it is up to the city to set tone of no defensiveness in accountability. We don't even have to be adversarial if there is willingness to answer our questions.

    It would also be good to know how we compare to other communities, states and countries. For instance, Canada and France may have more taxes, but no citizen ever is bankrupted by seeking healthcare. If our taxes are higher and we don't have the best education and healthcare for all . . . it isn't sustainable. A smart, healthy citizenry with knowledge of and a voice in local government is a worthy and sustainable goal.

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