◼ One of the nation's top credit rating agencies said Friday that it expects more municipal bankruptcies and defaults in California, the nation's largest issuer of municipal bonds. - AP
Moody's Investors Service said in a report that the growing fiscal distress in many California cities was putting bondholders at risk....
Moody's reports that some cities are turning bankruptcy as a new strategy to take on budget deficits and avoid obligations to bondholders, an emerging dynamic that could have ripple effects throughout the investment community.
...In California, officials rushed to downplay the report.
◼ City Watch Los Angeles: California is on the way to becoming an enormous version of Detroit - Doug Ross
The reason Democrat politicians and their supporters are completely insane is this: we can see the results of their policies in failed states like California.
Collective bargaining for public sector employees... unchecked environmental radicalism... crony capitalism... incredibly dense layers of regulation... demonization of business and industry... all the primary planks of the Democrat Party at the federal level. The alarm claxons are going off not only in Cali, but also in Washington.
◼ Is California the next Detroit? - Robert J. Cristiano/CityWatchLA
There was little outcry: California has a $16 billion deficit that no one seems to notice. Brown’s budget “assumes” that California voters will pass massive tax increases on themselves. If they do not, the 2013 deficit becomes a mind-numbing $20 billion. The budget, mandated to balance by the Calfornia Constitution, has been billions in the red for 10 straight years. How could Californians re-elect the same politicians year after year that produce budgets with multi-billion dollar deficits?
One Party Rule: Similarly, (to Detroit) California now has one-party rule. The Democrats of California did not need a single Republican vote to pass their budget. They now own the Golden State’s fate. The politicians’ plan to address the nation’s largest deficit is to raise taxes instead of cutting spending. If the Proposition 30 tax increase passes, the deficit would drop from $20 billion to a mere $12 billion.
Democrats have done nothing to cure the systemic problems of a bloated bureaucracy. Brown, referring to the state’s highway system, once said, “If we do not build it, they will not come.” Caltrans stopped building highways under Brown, but the people kept coming. Now 37 million Californians are locked in traffic jams each day.
Brown was rewarded for such prescience with re-election as Governor. California’s egotistical politicians passed AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act in 2006. Dan Sperling, an appointee to the California Air Resources Board, and a professor of engineering and environmental science at UC Davis, is the lead advocate on the board for a “low carbon fuel standard.” The powerful state agency charged with implementing AB 32 and other climate control measures claims the low carbon fuel standard will “only” raise gasoline prices $.30 gallon in 2013. But The California Political Review reported implementation of these the policies will raise prices by $1.00 per gallon.
Detroit was once the most prosperous manufacturing city in the world. Will California follow Detroit down a tragic path to ruin? In 1950, no one fathomed the Detroit of 2010. In 1970, when foreign imports started to make a foothold, the unions and their bought and paid for politicians resisted any change.
