Republicans and California

A quick update on the California melt down.

The California Senate Republicans have now ousted their leader who has apparently committed the treachery of trying to reach a compromise budget so that the State could survive. His departure after only seven months on the job is an illustration of how little sense there is in the Californian legislative process. The local GOP is moving further out onto the extreme right and has taken the stand that it will not support any budget that includes a tax increase. Of any kind. Presumably protecting the tax cut shibboleth is far more important than the 20,000 odd jobs about to be eliminated. Or keeping the schools open. Or anything else.

I mean what would the folks back in Orange County think of a GOP’er who supported a tax increase? The shame!

Such scorched earth dogmatic idiocy I would expect from a fringe party. But the Republicans? Surely even they want to save the state. Well maybe not. Obviously preserving their hard line anti-tax credentials is more important than fiscal sanity.

Oh well.

To learn more about this lunacy and the steady implosion of our most populous state check the story in today’s New York Times: G.O.P. Senate Leader in California Ousted