Twelve States Aim To Raise Taxes To Ease Shortfalls Caused By Their Own Overspending

by JASmius



You know all those gains at the State level that Republicans have been making over the past few cycles?  Governorships, State legislative seats and the like?  Don't get too used to that realignment.

Don't believe me?  Tally up the number of GOP governors preparing to syphon the citizenry that elected them to do the precise opposite:

With residents demanding improvements in transportation, infrastructure, and education, some governors — Republicans included — are pushing to raise taxes, the Wall Street Journal reported....

In Michigan, [freshly re-elected] GOP Governor Rick Snyder urged the public to support a proposition that would have hiked the state's sales and gas taxes, but voters rejected the scheme Tuesday.

In his first term, Snyder had pushed through a $1.7 billion tax cut for the business sector. He is now trying to cover a $325 million budget deficit, the Journal reported....

[Freshly re-elected] Nevada Republican Governor [and likely seeker of Harry (G)Reid's Senate seat] Brian Sandoval is pushing for increased taxes to cover programs in education, boost services, and provide pay hikes to state employees who had earlier taken salary cuts....

[Freshly re-elected] Republican Governor Sam Brownback of Kansas is also promoting targeted taxes to raise revenue, the Journal reported. He reduced income taxes in 2012 and 2013 to stimulate growth, and began funding schools using block grants. The State's $800 million budget shortfall has required it to shorten the school year, the Guardian reported.

I'm noticing a trend here, aren't you?  Republicans get elected to governorships as tax-cutters, cut taxes in their first terms but not spending, and then once re-elected continue not cutting spending and "evolve" into tax-hikers as well.  Yeah, that's the ticket to a long, long stretch in power.

Oh, sure, there are plenty of Democrat governors doing the same thing - Daniel Malloy of Connecticut, Tom Wolfe of Pennsylvania, my own State's hapless governor Jay Inslee - but they're Democrats; they're supposed to raise taxes incessantly and spend like drunken sailors.  It's what they were elected, neigh born, to do.  That's not supposed to be Pachyderms' job description.

Jobs they won't hold for long, at this rate.

Exit thought: Doesn't this highlight Scott Walker's Coolidgesque awesomeness even more?