Friday, May 08, 2009
Now Obama Throws California Under the Bus..
President Obama once again proved what I said shortly after he was elected- that the Obama White House would be the home of the Endless Campaign, and that the president's personal political considerations would trump everything else.This time, it was the entire State of California that wound up getting the dirty end of the stick.
The state, which accounts for roughly 1/6th of the US economy is in a severe financial crisis, a product of unbelievable spending by the Democrat majority in the Legislature, a tax policy that has driven business out of the state, out of control union contracts for public employees and the costs associated with the state's huge illegal alien problem.
Obama just managed to do his part to exacerbate the state's financial problems in two vital areas.
First, Obama threatened to rescind $6.8 billion in stimulus moneypromised the state unless Governor Schwartznegger and the state legislature restores wage cuts to state paid unionized workers that were approved in February as part of the budget deal and were expected to save the state $74 million.
The workers were part of the powerful Service Employees International Union(SEIU), who were key Obama supporters and gave $13.53 million to Obama's campaign.
Since the state was counting on that money to even have a slim chance at digging themselves out of the mess they created, they will have no choice but to knuckle under, and trimming the budget by attempting to lower wages to the state's public employees is off the table -which likely means layoffs in a state that already has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country.
Not content with that, Obama decided to let the other shoe drop. In his ridiculous new budget, Prez Zero has two major areas where he's made any cuts - national defense and killing the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAPP), a federal program that assists states with the cost of jailing illegal aliens.
Ending SCAPP is supposed to save $400 million for the Feds, which will then be tossed back in the lap of states like California if Obama's bloated budget passes.
Since a large part of the illegal alien problem results from lackadaisical enforcement of our laws and our borders, this has the effect of making states like California pay to clean up Washington's mess at a time when they can barely make ends meet - while scoring political points for Obama with the open borders and amnesty crowd.
Obama certainly knows where his bread is buttered, and if the rest of us have to pay for the meal it's obviously not something he's concerned with as long as his political allies are happy.
It's the Chicago way gone national.
Saturday, 9 May 2009
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