California Republicans, tax fighters and fiscal conservatives
are still hurting from the slow-motion train wreck of a special
election back in November.
It wasn’t just the election outcome, the 0-4 smackdown
that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s initiatives took at the
polls.
It was the fact that Schwarzenegger virtually waved the white
flag on his fiscally conservative agenda ““ and had the
“super” sense to do it on live television on election
night. Schwarzenegger could have just settled for a tactical
retreat; but he made it look like an unconditional surrender.
Fiscal conservatism suffered two defeats in November 2005: the
defeat of Schwarzenegger’s propositions and the
governor’s now questionable commitment to fiscal
conservatism.
In 2003, Schwarzenegger promised to govern as a fiscal
conservative and tear up the state’s credit card for good.
Now in 2006, the governor proposes to borrow $60 billion to upgrade
California’s ravaged and long-neglected infrastructure
““ somehow in the name of fiscal conservatism.
Twenty-seven months later in 2006, he became the fiscal
conservative who will outspend and out-borrow any Democrat in
Sacramento.
Fiscal conservatism means that taxes should be kept as low as
possible so people can make the most of their take-home pay (using
it to raise money for their families and save for college). It also
means that our tax dollars should be spent efficiently and wisely
by funding and using the services we already have before creating
and expanding social programs and giving lavish pay raises.
Suddenly, fiscal conservatism doesn’t seem like such an evil,
religious, right-wing idea.
Any nominally, politically astute person knows that borrowing
$60 billion runs a high probability (or virtual certainty) of
future tax hikes. Schwarzenegger may have the power to stop tax
hikes, but who knows what any future governor will do. Since not
enough people seem to care about kicking the state
Legislature’s addiction to overspending its revenues, the tax
hikes will definitely happen. That’s not so fiscally
conservative.
Regardless of what anyone thinks about fiscal solvency, 10
million more people will be added to the state’s population
within 20 years, and all Californians will have to suffer the
indignities of two-hour commutes and porta-classrooms if we
don’t do something about our 1950s-style highways and
schools.
In his State of the State address, Schwarzenegger made the case
that improvements to our roads, schools and hospitals are not just
a great idea, but that these improvements must happen. Californians
do not have a choice; these improvements are our
responsibility.
Maybe fiscal conservatives and tax fighters just have to suck it
in for the next 10 months until the 2006 election, but they can
still take away a few things from the governor’s
proposal:
Fiscal conservatives can take pride in the fact that
Schwarzenegger seeks only to provide something that should have
been done long ago, and something that everyone can use.
Sadly, this has not always been the case for the spendaholic
Democrats in Sacramento. When they dominated the state four years
ago, they burned through a $10 billion surplus all the way to a $30
billion deficit, but merely gave us an increased cost of government
by allowing the union bosses to dictate their own lavish pay and
pension raises.
Fiscal conservatives can also console themselves with the fact
that Schwarzenegger has decided to take a comprehensive “big
idea” approach, instead of resorting to the dubious state
budgetary process, where any improvements would only typically
happen by minor piecemeal increments during years when the state
Legislature hadn’t spent itself into another fiscal hell, and
when the huge budgetary commitments of education and health care
hadn’t already budgeted out infrastructure improvements for
those fiscal years.
The “big idea” approach may very well be the only
way we may get immediate and pronounced results (i.e., that these
improvements will actually happen at all) by taking them out of a
traditionally uncertain state budgetary process.
When you think about it, the governor really hasn’t
betrayed fiscal conservatism all that much. After all, fiscal
conservatism produces real results, and the governor’s big
idea is geared to produce results. Furthermore, these improvements
must happen sooner or later under any Republican or Democrat
governor; and last time I checked, Democrat gubernatorial wannabe
Phil Angelides has already indicated his willingness to raise
taxes.
Overall, I guess that’s somewhat fiscally
conservative.
Perng is a former Daily Bruin columnist.