Armageddon? It's Already Here

John Seiler:

“Armageddon” was the word columnist George Skelton used for what would happen if Gov. Jerry Brown’s $12 billion tax increase isn’t put on a special June ballot, then approved by voters. The two tax-lovers sat down for lunch.

Jerry’s actual words were: “It’ll be a war of all against all.”

In case you slept through Poli Sci 101, that’s a quote from Thomas Hobbes‘ “Leviathan.” He posited that, unless everyone was in thrall to a supreme sovereign — such as the royal he was sucking up to, Prince Charles, later King Charles — then there would be only chaos and life would be “solitary, nasty, brutish, and short.”

Ever since, governments have been using that as an excuse to control us. So Jerry’s just updating a 17th century homily for tyranny.

Skelton wrote of Brown’s peroration on what Armageddon would be like:

“I put up an all-cuts budget…. Then the Democrats change [the all-cuts budget] and put in gimmicks. Then I veto it. Then everybody sits there until we run out of money. It’s not going to be a pretty sight. It’s like one-two: No tax, all cuts, gimmicky budget, veto, paralysis.”

“There’ll be initiatives on taxing wine and beer and oil companies,” he says, “and a split roll” — taxing commercial real estate higher than residential. “And Republicans will counterattack” with anti-union measures and efforts to undermine the public sector.

“There’ll be an unleashing of left and right forces. Everyone will come out fighting. California will become a battleground…. It’ll be a war of all against all. The loser will be the people of California.”

But he, Skelton, the majority Democrats, and many Republicans still don’t get it: Armageddon already is here.

Even if put on the ballot, he tax increases are unlikely to be passed by voters. And even if the tax increases are passed by voters, the tax increases will just snuff out what minuscule economic recovery is going on now. Then there will be even less money for taxes. And even greater cuts will have to be made.

Gov. Davis, Gov. Schwarzenegger and successive Legislatures blew out the budget over the last decade. AB 32 and other anti-business bills chased tax-producing businesses and citizens from the state.

What’s going is the fallout from an Armageddon going on already.

March 10, 2011