Capitol Hill Blue Forums Hot Topics & Breaking News News Schwarzenegger Orders Min Wage For State Workers

If I am not mistaken the minimum wage for workers will make one hell of a lot of state workers eligible for food stamps and perhaps other subsistence programs which in turn will put a greater burden on the state and state workers who process public assistance claims. College tuitions won't get paid. Hotels and restaurants will lose business. Dental appointments will be canceled. A lot of money that normally comes from state workers will not be spent supporting local businesses.

I would imagine most citizens in California are going to get the kind of government service minimum wage pays for. It probably won't be pretty.

These days I've found that my faith in capitalism has waned considerably. In fact almost daily I discover more and more and feckin more of my country that has been ravaged by raw, unbridled capitalism. A bit of socialism in the mix would be a good thing. It seems California is willing to die for its Republican belief in capitalism. After the state workers it will soon hit the private businesses and the public.

A guy high up the ladder in Az Homeland Security once told me that the real threat to Arizona is California. He is unquestionably conservative and he was dead serious in what he said. Naturally I asked him what the hell he meant. He said that eventually California will become unglued either by a manmade or a natural disaster. He mentioned a couple of good sky burst nukes over international waters fired perhaps by a North Korea or Chinese sub. He said it could be a conex box at a port filled with nuclear waste and detonated at the doc. Or he said, earthquake, viral epidemic or a tsunami.

He said, people will have 3 evacuation choices: north, south or east. Human nature says the bigger the disaster the less likely the population will head north or south. Most, he said will head for Arizona and Nevada, to large cities where they rightly believe they will most likely find shelter and assistance. Let's be honest, not many people are going to show up in places like Nowhere, Arizona looking for help and a handout. A couple three or four million people arriving in Phoenix and Las Vegas would be a traveling disaster. It would quite literally create a disaster here and in Nevada, actually Phoenix and Las Vegas.

I cannot say this as something I know personally, but we have heard for a while now that more and more economic refugees from California are arriving in Arizona. We can't afford them. We don't have jobs for them. There's no doubt in my mind the $7.25 salary mandate for California state workers is going to create another huge wave of economic refugees. As we've had 7 days in a row over 110 degrees (yesterday was 115 and today 113) perhaps most of the new batch of refugees will land in Oregon and Colorado this time of the year.

Iss, is all democracy the same in your eyes?
I've often stated that pure democracy by itself is a lot like pure oxygen, nice to huff for a few minutes in an oxygen bar but deadly if you make a life's work of the stuff...volatile as hell too.
One spark and you have some vigorously accelerated combustion happening. Shove it straight down an intake manifold in pure form and watch it punch holes in the tops of your pistons.

Pure democracy is mob rule, and it later devolves into the manufacture of consent. Like anything else in pure form, democracy unbridled can be pure hell, and the half life ain't too great either, nor the by products.

As with anything else, nature DEMANDS a BALANCE.

In California, we have a perfectly reasonable constitutional amendment procedure: 2/3 of the Legislators have to approve the amendment to put it on the ballot. Then the voters have to approve it. Ths makes the state work as a Republic. (You know: A set of basic rules that take some effort and wide agreement to change.)

But the State Supreme Court (in a fit of excessive populism) decided that the initiative process can skip the legislature's approval. This makes us a Democracy versus a Republic, and the disaster that is Prop 13 shows why that is such a bad idea. It's just a variation on the Roman citizens voting for "bread and circuses". Convincing people they need to pay cash for their bread and cancel the free circus is nearly impossible.

And as The American Economy nears junk bond status it may become more and more balanced by Americans earning less and less than they have become accustomed to. Whether it be Governmental, Corporate, Small Business, or Personal; deficits do matter. Eventually the piper must be paid and eventually insolvency is the result of deficits.

It has been my observation that for those who pontificate about democracy, there are two kinds -- good democracy and bad democracy. The distinction is that if one is a part of the larger mob, that is good democracy; If one is a part of the smaller crowd, that is bad democracy.
Yours,
Issodhos

But do you view pure democracy in the same way that you view a more moderated form of representative democracy?

I am accepting of representative democracy when it is constrained within the framework of a constitutional republic that recognizes and defends the natural rights of the individual. In such a political structure the mobs can often be held at bay.
Yours,
Issodhos

Once you achieve numbers in double digits, the concept of a pure democracy becomes impossible. The various factions will invariable splinter to form smaller democracies or resort to violence to maintain order (???)
I'm not sure the parameters set forth by Issodhos have ever been achieved either, but it never hurts to hold out hopes for a better tomorrow.
Trying, possibly in vain, to get back on topic while mixing threads at the same time: We now have at least two states teetering on insolvency. Is it possible that a panic of some sort will soon occur?