Word: partisans
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Conservatives claim California is a high tax state. In fact, California's taxes are similar to other high-tech, industrial states. According to the non-partisan Legislative Analyst Office and the Tax Foundation, California has comparatively high sales taxes and rates for corporate income, but very low property taxes. State income taxes are very progressive, with a large proportion of revenue comes from households earning more than $100,000, as well as from taxes on stock options and capital gains. Low-income households, meanwhile, face lower tax rates that in most other states. This tax system, says Steve Peace, director...
...assessed at market value. To relieve the logjam in California politics, momentum is growing for an open primary system, in which the two top vote getters in the primary, regardless of party, would face each other in the general election. Proponents believe it would loosen the grip of partisan ideologies and make it easier of moderates to win elections. In addition, a redistricting reform won narrow approval last November and proponents of good government keep trying to lengthen the state's term limits on legislators...
...brought California to such a perilous state? How did its government become so wildly dysfunctional? One obvious cause is the deep recession, which has caused tax revenues to plunge for all states. But California's woes have a set of deeper reasons: direct democracy run amok, timid governors, partisan gridlock and a flawed constitution have all contributed to budget chaos and people in pain. And at the root of California's misery lies Proposition 13, the antitax measure that ignited the Reagan Revolution and the conservative era. In Washington, the Reagan-Bush era is over. But in California, the conservative...
...civil unions as an acceptable compromise could do more to raise the pressure on President Barack Obama and the Democrats to move toward embracing gay marriage than anything the ACLU could achieve. And with such Republican credentials, his involvement quietly indicts the notion that gay rights must be a partisan issue. (Read "Why Gay Marriage Was Defeated in California...
...Still, there’s more. A unified Democratic government passed a partisan $787 billion stimulus bill and another $410 billion spending bill. After promising to end the Republican tenure of pork-barrel spending, these massive bills included titanic lists of pork projects. The projected budget deficit for the fiscal year 2009 grew to $1.8 trillion, or a shocking and nearly unprecedented 12.3 percent of our gross domestic product. They then proceeded to pass a new record-breaking $3.6 trillion budget for the upcoming year...