That’s my executive summary of every GOP press release on Inslee’s proposal to close tax loopholes and not let temporary taxes expire. Take for instance this blog’s favorite legislator, Senator John Braun (R-Hates Workers, Especially Women).
Sen. Braun unimpressed by governor’s tax-increase proposal
If a terrible state Senator is impressed or not should be the main quality we should look for when we judge a proposal. If only I knew Pam Roach and Rodney Tom’s level of impressitude we could really figure this out.
Sen. John Braun’s reaction to the governor’s proposed new taxes totaling $1.4 billion in the next two years, including tax increases on businesses, oil refineries, beer and bottled-water drinkers and out-of-state shoppers, is simple:
I sort of get that this is press-releasees, and he wants to separate the quote out from the build up. But it reads strange to not just have it in the same paragraph.
“What happened to the promise you made six months ago to avoid tax increases?”
I haven’t studied the plan enough, or gone through the transcripts of the debates, etc. to see if that’s a fair assessment. But, that’s a political debate, not a policy one. If Inslee’s pledge was violated, then I’m sure there are campaign ads to be made and Kirby Wilbur will complain on all the TV and radio that will have him. That’s fair. But if a legislator wants to do it, he should maybe stick to the policy.
Braun is also concerned about the increases for state employees while increasing in state tuition by as much as 5 percent.
“The governor’s proposal is a slap in the face of college students everywhere,” said Braun, R-Centralia. “We outline a plan that reduces tuition by 3 percent across the board, and he intends to increase rates for students enrolled in our two biggest schools by 5 percent per year?”
Argh press-releasees. Having a paragraph just to lead up to a quote and then a completely unnecessary “said Braun” in the middle. That’s terrible. Although this is actually on the merits, of the policy. I guess those merits are we can’t pay public workers unless there’s no tuition hike? I’m against any tuition hike, but that seems like silly logic.
“This is about a promise to working families and our unemployed friends, family and neighbors,” Braun said. “How are we going to promote private-sector job growth when the state budget calls for additional taxes on state businesses, computer software, phone service and new taxes on automobile purchases?”
Now we’ve broken the next paragraph up with “Braun said.” I literally hate his legislative aid, and I don’t even know who they are.
Sorry, I went off on a tangent there. Here’s the answer: By being able to afford to educate children who’ll be able to start the next business and who’ll make better employees. By not further dismantling the safety net so people are willing to take risks to start businesses. By contributing to the infrastructure that makes Washington attractive to businesses. Oh, that was a rhetorical question.
Also, for the trillionth time, while private sector job growth is important, a job is a job is a job. If that job is one of the state jobs that were bemoaned pay increases in the previous paragraph, or in the private sector, it still is important for the person who has it.
There’s more, but it’s basically more of the same, so I’ll leave it here. No actual proposals of its own, but plenty of bashing state workers and whining about taxes.
Carl,
As depressing as it is, the fact that these under educated troglodytes can suck themselves fat at the teat of wingnut welfare just goes to show that spending money on education is a fools errand.
Yes, I know. :-(
Braun, like all Republicans, never met a budget that couldn’t be balanced on someone else’s back. (In this case, state employees.) His promise to those working families is, “No COLAs this year or next.” Some promise.
Meanwhile, there’s not much hope for the GOP’s efforts to refurbish its battered image while GOP congressmen keep calling immigrant workers “wetbacks” …
http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_.....orers?lite
Apparently the House Democrat caucus also has ‘no actual proposals of its own’, either.
The GOP-led majority in the Senate will issue its budget in the coming days, followed by House Democrats.
http://blogs.seattletimes.com/.....s-morning/
Inslee’s proposal is a wish list, little more. As a kid I used to make those up every year, just before Christmas.
Looking forward to the permanent extension of the 20% increase in the B&O tax Inslee has planned. It’s especially comforting to know that the aerospace industry doesn’t have to share my burden. Why not, Governor?
I though this was just grammatically botched and painful to read:
Just another garden-variety Neanderthal demanding a dismantling of government, with as much pain and upward redistribution of wealth as possible. Just like cheapshotBob. Yawn.
One really has to look around to learn that Inslee will let UW/WSU tuition rise by up to 10% over the next two years:
Inslee would allow continued tuition increases of up to 5 percent at the University of Washington and Washington State University, and 3 percent at other state universities.
http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2013/03/
So, students get to cough up, while Boeing gets a mulligan.
My parents used to laugh at politicians who promise to increase services while reducing fees and taxes. Nothing much has changed since then.
A lot of Republicans didn’t see a thing wrong with budget deficits while George W. Bush was in office, but suddenly “found religion” once Pres. Obama took office. They hoped it was a hot-button issue which would not only appeal to the Tea Party, but also to some independent voters. They thought they had won on that issue in the 2010 elections, but it turns out that their victories there were mostly due to the economy not recovering fast enough, and low voter turnout (lots of Democrats were dealing with their own problems, including relocation and job hunts, etc.). When they tried to revive the issue in 2012, it had almost no impact.
But since the Republicans just about always continue to repeat the same errors over and over again, they are still harping about the need for budget cuts (and tax cuts), despite voters rejecting those same policies in the 2012 elections. But while mouthing the same talking points, they are also encountering voters who are complaining to them about the high cost of sending their sons and daughters off to the U.W. or W.S.U. Trying to resolve this conflict of cutting state funding while cutting tuition is a logical impossibility, so they don’t even try to reconcile the conflict.
“…It’s especially comforting to know that the aerospace industry doesn’t have to share my burden. Why not, Governor?”
Come’on, Bob, you know the answer to that one. It’s high-paying jobs. Other states give away free land, major improvements, cash subsidies, tax amnesty, etc. in return for large companies relocating there. Here they just offer a favorable tax rate.
But it’s not just Boeing. Washington State, combined with several counties in the Puget Sound region, and quite a few community colleges have been working together to diversify and expand the aerospace companies located here. Sure, Boeing and it’s first-tier subcontractors are a big draw. But those firms are being encouraged to sell their products worldwide – even to Airbus. This year the Wash. State Dept. of Commerce is allowing companies to tag along to the Paris Air Show, and have a booth in the state pavilion, at a fraction of the cost a firm would have to pay on it’s own – which is a big incentive to the smaller companies seeking to expand their contacts in order to generate sales worldwide. We may eventually get to the point where the smaller firms are guiding state policy, rather than Boeing.
@ 7
Trying to resolve this conflict of cutting state funding while cutting tuition is a logical impossibility
Er, no. The conflict is resolved by limiting funding, preventing/minimizing tuition increases, and expecting the university system to make cuts to deal with the problem. Tuition expanded dramatically over the past twenty years. After all that money being pumped into the system, now some of it needs to be pumped back out. If departments need to be merged to save on administration and facility expenses, so be it.
You seem to be working from an assumption that universities do not have the ability to cut. That assumption is flawed.
@3. Wetback. Back in the 90s, in Southern Oregon, my sister and I had a discussion with our dad, about the term “Wetback”. My father was a liberal, in an area that worshiped Rush Limbaugh and had an active John Burch Society, but he had this blind spot on “Wetback”. He would never think to use or allow derogatory terms for black people, but Mexicans were fair game. He was unwilling to admit that it wasn’t just a mild term like “redneck” or “Grease Monkey” for mechanic. It was a several hour wide ranging discussion but we got him to see our points. I never heard him use the term, on ones like it again.
My father felt that everyone had the capacity to be racist, but the better people, found a way to minimize those tendencies, to not act on them. My father, once he became aware he was doing it, made himself better.
It’s fascinating watching the republican party, strive to get better, or just appear better, to win elections.
@ 10
It’s fascinating watching the republican party, strive to get better, or just appear better, to win elections.
Well, paying off supporters is already taken by the Dems. GOP has to do something to distinguish itself.
@ 10
I grew up in SoCal. The only time I ever heard that term as a kid was on the school bus when I was in 8th grade. Another kid used it as a slur against the bus driver. She immediately stopped the bus and kicked him off of it. Kid had a walk of around 3-4 miles if I recall correctly. I had no idea what the word meant. Think I forgot to ask about it when I got home.
“He would never think to use or allow derogatory terms for black people, but Mexicans were fair game.”
For my part, I’m no bigot as I’ve got slurs for everybody.
“My father felt that everyone had the capacity to be racist, but the better people, found a way to minimize those tendencies, to not act on them. My father, once he became aware he was doing it, made himself better.”
I can agree with that. We are who we want to be, become who we want to become. Nobody else is responsible but us. As for his slurs, maybe he comes from a different time, as I did. Some words I used by which I meant no real offense were dropped later than others because some lessons were learned sooner than others.
One time about fifteen years ago I had hung up on a client and I let loose with a slur that must have been heard by half the office, 50 people, and possibly another client or two. He was being a stupid architect is all. It happens. My slur was so wrong. It was my Dear Ms. Wingnut, of all people, who came to me and said something. Just a few words in a whisper. I never did it again, not even close. Well, except in these comments. Heh. Just kidding.
13, 14 – I, too, grew up in an earlier time when racial epithets were commonly heard and adapted myself to changing societal norms. (Not that I ever used the epithets, but I stopped laughing politely at race jokes, among other things.)
Since then, I’ve thought that words like “asshole,” “jerk,” “goatfucker,” and “motherfucker” are sufficient for all purposes, plus they have the advantage of being race and gender neutral, specific, and factually accurate when correctly applied.
@4 Republican troglodytes will not write the state budget any more than they will write the federal budget, for the obvious reason they do not control the other legislative house or the executive veto in either instance.
@9 The university doesn’t “need” to do anything to satisfy you. In this context, “need” is a value judgment of yours, which “need not” be adopted by the university or anyone else. In general, I don’t agree with your value judgments on most budgetary or other subjects. My own value judgment is that Washington “needs” the best university we can afford with the widest possible range of course offerings that can be funded by whatever resources the university can get from the legislature, tuition fees, and other sources. In addition, Washington “needs” the great research institution it has had for many years, once again within whatever resources the university can get from the legislature, research grants, and other sources. If your agenda is to downsize and downgrade our state university in the name of knee-jerk opposition to any and all taxes, we must agree to disagree. If you are able to make a reasoned and fact-supported argument for making constructive changes to how the university carries out its instructional and research activities, then make it. So far, you haven’t.
Actually, I feel a bit of sympathy for Don Young. I’ve got an uncle just like that – he never understood why calling someone a racist name was wrong, he’s continuously in the “What? What did I say?” mode. He’s in his upper 80’s now, and I’ve given up on trying to change him.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t derive a little bit of pleasure from the discomfort it causes to the GOP when a Republican congressman, who should know better, makes such comments.
To save money, I propose that the teachers in WA state be compelled to do what teachers in Michigan have done.
They gave up raises so they could keep their precious collective bargaining rights:
Teachers agreed to forego a 2-percent pay hike due before next year and instead accepted a pay freeze as well as concessions in health care coverage and longevity pay. Some step increases will remain. District officials estimate a savings of $11 million throughout the duration of the extended agreement.
http://www.macombdaily.com/art.....ontracts#3
Since teachers in WA already have collective bargaining, they can do without pay increases as well. Saves dough, which can be put into actually helping the kids.
It’s For The Children.
Right?
To save money, I propose that Serial “GET HELP” Conservative be compelled to take a pay cut from his government job.
Once again, The Children.
Get help. Really. Get some help.
Speaking of getting help, it appears our old friend, Jim Miller, has finally taken up drunkblogging. Should we schedule an intervention?
@21
Followed your link…looks like Mr. Miller has sworn off comments, if not the sauce.
I read the prior post on (un)SP, just idle curiosity, like slowing down at a trainwreck, and found warrenpeterson trying to rebut Danny Westneat’s assertion that the economy is thriving in “Seattle with all its taxes and rules and supposedly socialistic groupthink…” (quoting Westneat), with this (referring to why he thinks companies would want to stay in socialist hell-hole Seattle):
Transportation services, educated population and environment.
Wow, just wow.
So apparently the thrust here is that GOP is baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad for proposing spending that won’t cost money, and not providing details.
Is, then, our president equally baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad for doing essentially the same thing
Alan Krueger, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, said the program will total $21 billion but vowed that it would not increase the deficit. Details of the costs of the program will be outlined in the president’s budget, which will be presented on April 10.
“They will not increase the deficit by a dime because they are paid for in our budget,” Krueger told reporters aboard Air Force One Friday.
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/po.....ob-growth/
yesterday?
Perhaps President Obama is owed the courtesy of a little patience on our part, so that he can explain how this proposal is paid for in about two weeks.
Pity that WA GOP isn’t due the same basic courtesy.
“Better employees”????
We’re talking about Cheap Labor Conservatives(tm), aren’t we? To that crowd, the only “good employee” is one who’s desperate enough to work like a dog for next to nothing, and too ignorant to think it should be any different.