The following coalition letter was sent to Nevada’s congressional delegation today…
From the “Department of Paranoia Will Destroy Ya” comes this update on Senate Higher-Taxation Committee Chairman Bob Coffin.
On Sunday, Assemblyman Ed Goedhart (R-Amargosa Valley) sent an email to his legislative colleagues with four fiscally responsible ideas he urged them to embrace while dealing with the budget this session, in addition to reaffirming his own position against balancing the budget with tax hikes.
Apparently it’s not just liberal Republicans who are upset with those of us who don’t want our taxes raised. The liberal public school lobby known as the PTA is all stirred up, as well. One of my “spies” in the organization sent this report this morning:
The office phone of State Sen. Bob Coffin (D-Las Vegas) was ringing off the hook yesterday as the result of a Nevada Republican Party lobbying effort to head off tax increases by the Legislature this session.
In a Las Vegas Sun story today, Sen. Townsend tossed out this gem: “Very rarely have I seen wasteful spending.”
It was preceded by this declaration by Gibbons’ spokesman Dan Burns: “The notion that we have some kind of fat, bloated budget that can be trimmed is simply wrong. The budget we have submitted is bare bones.”
Good grief, Charlie Brown.
“General Motors will cut 10,000 jobs, or 14% of its salaried work force, this year as the auto maker struggles to cope with a steep drop in world-wide vehicle sales,” reports the Wall Street Journal today. “The job cuts are part of the plan the company submitted to Congress in December to secure bailout funding from the federal government. Also, most salaried employees will see a 3% to 7% pay cut, while executives will get a 10% reduction.”
There’s something to mull over here for the Nevada Legislature.
One of the dumbest things the Nevada Legislature has done in recent years was move the party primary elections from the first Tuesday in September to August – right smack in the middle of the dog days of summer, which in Las Vegas generally runs around 110 degrees.
Talk about pulling the rug out from under you. Talk about sucking the air out of your balloon. Talk about killing a rally. Talk about “Republican” U.S. Sens. Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins.
As state legislators grapple with the problems they caused themselves by over-spending the budget for the last few years, one thing has become crystal-clear: The Left will oppose any budget cuts to any program of any amount for any reason anywhere at any time. In their minds, every taxpayer dime the government spends on every program, agency or service is “essential.”
