Our votes come back to haunt us. . .

It appears that Jerry Brown has a new year surprise in store for us.

http://caivn.org/article/2010/12/13/jerry-browns-judo-budget-crisis-ploy

I have little hope that my fellow Californians will suddenly behave like adults and take their medicine. We either have to pay for the services we want or do without them. For some unknown reason we don’t believe that simple fact and maybe the Governor elect’s ploy is what it will take to shake us awake and make us really pay attention to the facts rather than the fantasy that seems to occupy our thoughts at the moment.

I’m ready to endure a bit of austerity in the form of higher taxes and even some fees for the services I make the greatest use of. I admit I’ll grumble when my yearly tax bill rolls around. But I’ll remind myself, as I do repeatedly, that I enjoy the services I generally take for granted in the interim. In fact, it’s only because those services have become so threadbare in their current, starved state that I grumble as much as I do.

So, do you think that Jerry’s election ultimatum will do the trick? Would you vote for taxes if the alternative is a barebones school system, deferred road maintenance, laid off fire and police protection and mass releases from our overcrowded prison system? Of course, personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing some categories of prisoner released from our prison industrial complex but that’s just me.

Chime in. Let me know if you’re one of the majority in the state who is convinced that eliminating waste fraud and abuse will deal with a deficit that now exceeds 30% of the entire budget.