I apologize in advance for my long tirade. You are right, we do tend to tirade on here. We are Pissed off.

How about a thought experiment?

CAR imagine if we had no income tax (lots of states don’t). Where do you think our economy would be? Or is our 12.3% unemployment rate completely unrelated to the restrictive government largess and high taxes that go to pay for it? Is it all the fault of the financial sector?

I found myself agreeing with everything you said starting out, but then in every post I have seen you find yourself in the curious position of defending those middle managers. You accuse everyone of not knowing the facts, and you are right. We do not know everything about the details of these employees jobs duties or the pych problems related. But there are some facts that cause the average Californian to want to go on a witch hunt and for good reason.

1. We are one of the highest taxed states in the country.
2. We have the highest budget deficit in the country.
3. We pay a lot more for lower quality services than most states (prison guards are a great example).

So why would we look to the financial sector to reform (and it clearly needs to be reformed), when clearly our state government is corrupt beyond measure. Maybe we shouldn’t point figures at jobs we do not know all the intricacies of, but we are on a witch hunt because of those simple facts. And until those facts are no longer true statements, I and many like me will want blood.

I grow tired of pointing out your false link between financial sector reform and government reform. They both need to happen, but financial reform is not a precondition for government reform.

On top of all of this. Instead of getting in there and canning some wasteful middle managers and reforming pension spikes and double dipping, all we get is furloughs (man I would love a furlough) and closed state parks in an effort to bully us into higher taxes. It is enough to make you want to lash out at everything.