As Molly Ivins wrote about Ross Perot when he declared that the problem with Texas schools was too much football, KY House repugs have gone crazier than a peach orchard boar.
They wrote a budget that not only reverses the governor's spending cuts, but does so by - wait for it - raising taxes.
Or maybe they are not so crazy as they are fucking terrified of their pissed-off voters replacing them with Dems in November.
But don't worry: the taxes they propose are all on working people. They completely ignore the giant hordes of cash stolen by corporations and the already filthy rich.
Good job, House repugs. Keep making it easier for Democratic candidates to turn out our voters.
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/education/article202759424.html#storylink=cpy
In a budget plan unveiled Wednesday, House Republicans proposed three
tax increases they said would raise about $500 million over the next two
years, which they would largely use to reverse spending cuts to
education programs proposed by Gov. Matt Bevin.
The Republican’s plan raises the
tax on a pack of cigarettes by 50 cents, eliminates a $10 individual
income tax credit and levies a 25 cent tax on prescription opioids each
time a dosage is sold by a distributor to a pharmacy, the first such tax
in the country, according to the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Steven Rudy,
R-Paducah.
Oh, look, guys: an actual tax reform plan that raises $600 million to save employee pensions while preserving essential programs and making the greedhead rich start paying their fair share.
But no. That's not what the repugs who own KY state government want. They want an excuse to to the state economy into Haiti. Destroying the lives of 35,000 state employees is just gravy.
State Rep. James Kay,
D-Versailles, last week filed a package of five bills that could
collect more than $600 million a year in fresh revenue for Kentucky’s
ailing public pension systems with taxes on tobacco, prescription
opiates and outsourced labor and potentially raise even more money by
scrutinizing the state’s long-unexamined tax breaks.
But Kay’s plan appears dead on arrival.
House Speaker Pro Tem David Osborne,
R-Prospect, on Friday said the Republican-led House of Representatives
won’t consider any bills during this legislative session that simply
raise additional revenue — not even for the state’s $40 billion in
unfunded pension liabilities.
SNIP
In an interview outside Osborne’s Capitol office, Kay said
he isn’t surprised that his bills are doomed. For all of the talk of a
“pension crisis” in Frankfort, Republican leaders in the General
Assembly won’t consider anyone’s ideas but their own, which focus on
cutting retirement benefits for teachers and other public workers, he
said.
“I’ve worked on this comprehensive plan for three years,” said Kay, who is a member of the Public Pension Oversight Board.
“I presented this plan
in its raw form to the pension oversight board, and it got no response,”
Kay said. “I presented this plan to House leadership; same reaction.
The current approach is to cut benefits and not to raise revenue. They
don’t want to look at anything that’s outside of that box. They want to
solve this problem on the backs of state employees and teachers.”
James Kay for Governor, goddammit.
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article199676599.html#storylink=cpy
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article199676599.html#storylink=cpy
As Bevin and his billionaire buddies light their cigars with C-notes they stole from working Kentuckians, the legislature is slashing and burning what's left of Kentucky's economy.
Because for the nth time, rich people and corporations don't create jobs; working people who spend their paltry paychecks create jobs.
But repugs are making sure working Kentuckians don't have any money to spend.
Now the legislature is preparing to write a two-year budget that
Republican Gov. Matt Bevin warned this week will be “brutal” because of a
massive increase in costs for public pensions, as well as Medicaid and
prisons. Lawmakers say they have no political appetite in this election
year for tax increases that would raise more revenue. So everyone is
bracing for the worst.
“They are — they are systemically ruining our schools on purpose,” Dunn said at the Capitol rally, wiping tears from her eyes.
The economic catastrophe in Kansas has proven beyond all doubt that budget cuts drive a state into bankruptcy. Only more revenue - massive taxes on the rich and corporations - and spending on education and infrastructure and health care can save and grow an economy.
But Kentucky repugs see the Democratic tsunami coming this year and they think avoiding necessary tax increases is going to save them.
It won't. It will just hand a dying state to the Democratic candidates who take back the General Assembly in November.
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article193214139.html#storylink=cpy
For more than 40 years, working Americans have paid through the ass for tax cuts for the rich. No more. Tax the motherfuckers out of existence with 90 percent tax on investment income - the kind they get by sitting on their ass - and estates - which they get by being born - and use it to repay working Americans with infrastructure and renewable energy and publicly owned high-speed wifi and free college and universal health care and basic incomes.
Twenty years ago we knew this shit was false, but didn't have the real-world proof to show. Now we do. Colorado. Washington. Nevada. Maine. Massachusetts. California.
Kentucky is missing out on the pot economic bonanza that could not only solve all our budget and pension problems but also the opioid epidemic.
But no. Because only rich white men are entitled to money and good drugs.
Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin (R) appeared on a local radio show this week and called legalized marijuana a “sucker’s bet,” and something that will never happen so long as he’s in office. Why? Bevin says he’s concerned about overdoses.
“We
are not, while I’m governor, going to be legalizing the use of
marijuana in this state for recreational purposes or for
revenue-generating purposes,” Bevin said on Terry Meiner’sWHAS radio show. “There are people overdosing based on ingestion of products that are edibles and things.”
Contrary
to what the governor believes, however, while an individual can
certainly have a “bad trip” from marijuana usage, there have beenzero reported deathsfrom marijuana “overdoses,” according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Bevin
points to the uptick in marijuana-related emergency room visits in
Colorado, one of the first states to legalize marijuana, as evidence of
the danger it poses. It is true, Colorado did see anincrease in emergency room visits following
legalization, according to a study released by the state’s Department
of Public Safety. From 2014 to mid-2015, 956 emergency room visits per
every 100,000 were possibly related to marijuana consumption. In the
years before it was legalized, from 2010 to 2013, that figure was 739
per every 100,000 visits.
The
study’s authors, however, attribute that rise to the decrease in stigma
surrounding marijuana; after legalization, more people were open to
trying the drug for the first time who may not have been aware of the
side effects.
“The
most common reason someone goes to the ER for a marijuana reaction is
anxiety,” says Dr. Larry Bedard, former president of the American
College of Emergency Physicianstold The Cannibist.
“Part of an anxiety reaction is you have an impending sense of doom. So
a lot of people come in (to the hospital) thinking they’re dying, when
they’re actually having a panic attack. That’s very common. If you’re
smoking a joint and suddenly you can’t breathe and your chest feels
tight and you start to get numb and tingly, you start to think you’ve
been poisoned.” And
even though Bevin calls the notion of legalizing marijuana a “sucker’s
bet,” Colorado has been consistently reaping its economic benefits.
Legalized marijuana roughly 8,005 full-time jobs and added about $2.4 billion to the state’s economy last year, an analysis from the Marijuana Policy Group (MPG) shows. The pot business is a stronger economic driver than nearly 90 percent of industries active in Colorado.
Meanwhile, legislators and cops are flooding the state with STOOPIT.
From the Legislative Research Commission:
Marijuana’s impact on public safety examined
FRANKFORT
– As Kentucky lawmakers explore ways to pay for public employee
pensions, a coalition of law enforcement groups say legalizing marijuana
for recreational use isn’t the answer.
“I’m
not willing to risk my grandchildren’s health to save my pension,”
Kentucky State Police Commissioner Richard W. Sanders said yesterday
while testifying before the Interim Joint Committee on Veterans,
Military Affairs and Public Protection. “I don’t think that is the right
way to go with this thing.”
Sanders is a 40-year law enforcement veteran with 21 years vested in the state’s hazardous duty pension.
Kentucky Office of Drug Control Policy Executive Director Van Ingram testified (sic: LIED) that marijuana is harmful to society.
“Sixty
years ago big tobacco downplayed the risk of tobacco,” Ingram said. “We
can see where that brought us: Huge settlements and big changes to that
industry. Thirty years ago big pharma told us there was no risk of
addiction to opioids. We can see where that brought us: The largest drug
epidemic in the nation’s history.”
He added that 10 to 15 percent of people who use marijuana develop addiction issues.
“We
are getting led down another path so some folks with a lot better suits
than I have can make a lot of money,” Ingram said. “We certainly got
enough addiction issues in this state without bringing more to the
table.”
Rep.
Tom Burch, D-Louisville, however, said Prohibition gave rise to crime
…”and criminalizing marijuana has done the same thing.”
National
Marijuana Initiative (MMI) Director Ed Shemelya testified that
marijuana is legal for recreational use in eight states. He said at
least one form of marijuana is legal for medical use in more than 21
states. He said Colorado is on track to sell $1 billion worth of
marijuana this year and generate roughly $200 million in tax revenue.
“That’s a lot of money,” Shemelya said. “There is no disputing that.”
Again, states like Colorado are reaping all the benefits: massive tax revenues, reduced opiod use, more jobs and less crime because dealers of illegal pot are now out of work.
But Kentucky under repug rule can never have nice things.
Kentucky's state worker pension plan is running out of money because for decades,k the General Assembly has refused to pay its obligations into the retirement system. Legislators used the money they are constitutionally required to invest in the retirement plan and used it to plug holes in the budget.
The legislature stole Kentucky's retirement payments so they wouldn't have to balance the budget by making rich fucks and foreign corporations pay their fair share of taxes.
Then they broke the law in 2002 by cancelling state employee's statutorily-mandated annual raises.
They they slashed benefits for new hires, making state government employment less attractive than the night shift at Wendy's.
Now Governor "I Got Mine, Fuck You" Bevin wants to make state workers and retirees pay for the legislature's crimes with the retirement benefits the state constitution mandates.
Fuck off and die, motherfucker. Raise taxes on the rich fucks and corporations who have skated on taxes for decades. Get the money they stole from state workers. Restore the pension plan with that recovered money.
Then raise taxes again on the rich fucks and corporations to pay their fair share now and in the future. Do that, and we might have an economy that supports a 21st century Commonwealth, with good schools and good jobs and a healthy, sustainable environment.
An independent consultant recommended sweeping changes Monday to the
pension systems that cover most of Kentucky’s public workers, creating
the possibility that lawmakers will cut payments to existing retirees
and force most current and future hires into 401(k)-style retirement
plans.
SNIP
The group, which was hired by Bevin, offered only recommendations. Any
changes to the pension system would come during a potential special
legislative session in October.
Over. Our. Dead. Bodies.
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article169821392.html#storylink=cpy
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article169821392.html#storylink=cpy
I still think the "Rally to Restore Sanity" was stupid and dangerous. At the very moment the repugs were revealing themselves as destructive nihilists, Stewart and Colbert gave them bipartisan cover.
Yet
the numbers don’t lie. Legal, recreational, adult-use cannabis is
already a multi-billion-dollar industry even with less than 10 percent
of the U.S. population currently living in states with an operational
marketplace. Legalization states have seen huge tax revenues and significant job growth
from pot, begun cashing in large savings from reduced criminal justice
system spending, and watched the black markets in their states shrink precipitously.
The
early returns from legalization have already caught the attention of
other states. By the end of 2018, the share of the American populace
living in states where buying and selling pot is legal and closely
regulated will have more than doubled.
The pot jackpot train is leaving the station. Jump on it, Kentucky, before we're left behind. Again.
Crushing working Kentuckians with 30 percent sales taxes on food is not going to solve this problem. Only forcing a crowbar into the bulging wallets of rich people and corporations is going to prevent the Commonwealth from declaring bankruptcy.
Moody’s
has downgraded the debt issued by Kentucky’s state government by one
level, to a Aa3 rating, warning bond investors that the state does not
collect enough revenue to resolve its $37 billion public pension
shortfall.
“The commonwealth has one of the
heaviest unfunded pension burden of all states,” Moody’s wrote in a
report that it published for bond investors last week. “The
commonwealth's ability to stop the decline in pension funding levels
will be crucial to its credit profile.”
Gov. Matt Bevin is expected to call a special session of the General Assembly
later this year to address the state’s pension debt and its tax code.
The new Moody’s report is only the latest alarm to draw attention to
both of those subjects.
The state expects to
face tens of billions in unfunded liabilities in coming years at
Kentucky Retirement Systems, which provides pension benefits for state
and local government retirees, and Kentucky Teachers’ Retirement System,
which covers educators. Officials blame several factors for the
shortfall, including inadequate contributions by the state and poor
investment returns.
It's not just the fact that for 30 years Kentucky governors and legislators have stolen billions from the pension system to balance budgets and avoid raising taxes on the rich. It's also that Kentucky still has a resource-extraction economy that rivals Mississippi for third-world stupidity.
Bevin's special session will aggravate that feudal economy by stripping money from the middle class and poor to further enrich the already obscenely rich.
But it will earn him raves from the GOP donor class who will fund his national political ambitions. Because Gov. Connecticut Carpetbagger has always seen Kentucky as nothing more than a piggy bank to rob.
While Governor "I Got Mine, Fuck You" Bevin plots to kick your granny into a ditch, make you pay a 20 percent tax on food and give you a stick to bite on in place of pain relief, dems in Wisconsin have found a way to increase revenue painlessly.
Legalize
marijuana, of course. $40 million a year. Not even selling poorer
Kentuckians into slavery would bring in that much money. As a bonus, no
more opioid crisis! The longer Kentucky waits, the more market share
the smart states are gobbling up.
Democratic
state rep. Tod Ohnstad says it's striking that Republicans are fighting
amongst themselves over where to scrape together money for schools and
roads.
"One solution is staring us in the face and that is the legalization of marijuana," Ohnstad said.
Ohnstad is a supporter of the latest attempt to legalize recreational marijuana in Wisconsin. He says there's a pile of money waiting for lawmakers trying to finish the budget.
"It
is estimated that between 30 to 49 million dollars a year in revenue
would be generated actually, if it was legalized," Ohnstad said.
The
new measure would, among other things, allow growing pot plants for
personal use and calls for consumer protection to insure the quality of
marijuana getting sold.
Not just predictable, but predictED by many of us who
screamed bloody murder about $18 million in state tax dollars and
millions more in local tax dollars going unconstitutionally to a
creationist boondoggle.
Now the locals who stupidly put their faith in grifters touting an invisible sky wizard are reaping what they sowed.
I'd laugh, except that it's my tax dollars they are stealing.
Plants’
partner, Matt Griffith, moved to Williamstown from West Virginia last
September, when he opened the restaurant, and he readily admits that
those hordes have not yet appeared. In fact, he closed it down for three
months over the winter.
“No one really knows
it’s here,” he said. “Signage is our biggest issue,” partly because the
restaurant sits on one side of Interstate 75 and the Ark is on the
other. “But I like to be optimistic. We’ve been here a year and it’s
going to grow.”
Stormey Vanover is less hopeful.
She
has operated Country Heart Crafts on Williamstown’s Main Street for the
past nine years, sometimes with a profit, sometimes at a loss.
“We
do get a few people from the Ark, but they don’t really know we’re
here,” she said amid the Kentucky-made soaps, candles and ornaments
featured in her store, which is surrounded by empty storefronts. “It’s
just not impacting us the way we thought it would.”
Maybe because impact has no meaning as a verb except in reference to teeth or bodily orifices.
It
has been almost a year since Ark Encounter opened, promising a surge of
economic development in the county of 24,000 people in return for
generous state and local tax breaks.
Ark
co-founder Mike Zovath said the attraction will attract its 1 millionth
visitor by July, but there is no way to independently verify that
number. He says all of Answers in Genesis, including the Creation
Museum, will employ about 900 people this summer.
Locals
do see cars and tour buses full of tourists eager to see the life-size
wooden boat, filled with exhibits of young-Earth creationism, an
animatronic Noah and friendly dinosaurs. What they don’t see is those
tourists crossing over I-75 to drive the mile or two into downtown
Williamstown to eat, drink and shop.
Main
Street has been in decline since the 1970s, when I-75 replaced KY-25 as a
major north-south artery that was filled with cars and people, locals
say. The Ark was the first ray of hope the city had seen in years.
In
his office at the old county courthouse, Grant County Judge-Executive
Steve Wood has heard all the complaints. Dry Ridge, about five miles
north on I-75, has seen an uptick in hotel and restaurant business, but
Williamstown, which sits farther off the interstate, hasn’t appeared to
share in the bounty.
Wood knows that tourism
revenue is up based on hotel tax receipts, but as the anniversary of Ark
Encounter approaches, he doesn’t think the benefits are yet outweighing
what Grant County and the state gave away.
“It’s
a really bad deal for taxpayers,” Wood said of the Ark Encounter’s
agreements with the county and city, which were made before he took
office last year. The biggest property tax break will be in place for 30
years. “It was a shock for me because I didn’t really know all the
details. Maybe I should have.”
Answers
in Genesis received a generous combination of state and local
incentives, acknowledging in numerous documents that without them, the
$100 million attraction would not be built in Grant County.
Former
Gov. Steve Beshear’s administration awarded the project a sales tax
rebate under the state’s Tourism Development Incentive Program for as
much as $18 million over 10 years. It was later canceled
after state officials found out that the attraction would require
declarations of Christian faith from potential employees. Ark officials
sued and won in federal court. Gov. Matt Bevin’s administration then reappproved the initial request.
The company will report its first-year sales to the Tourism Development Finance Authority in August, officials said.
The
state also agreed to expand the I-75 interchange at costs that ranged
between $9 million and $11 million. State transportation officials
recently decided to rebuild the exit ramps at a cost of $2.4 million,
making them wider so traffic doesn’t back up onto I-75. That project is
scheduled to start this fall.
Grant
County and Williamstown officials also offered a series of incentives,
none of which have accountability measures, such as requiring the
company to maintain a certain number of jobs.
SNIP
The first year of the
Ark park has coincided with the near-bankruptcy of Grant County,
troubles that stem from inefficiencies and overspending at the county
jail. Wood and the fiscal court recently
implemented a 2 percent payroll tax, which will infuse a much-needed $3
million into county coffers. That tax will drop to 1.5 percent in the
second year and 1 percent in the third.
SNIP
“The
Ark’s growth is great for their success,” Murphy said. “But until we
see some of that here, it’s really not done as well as we hoped.”
They're not satisfied with the constitutional right to spew lies and indoctrinate stupidity into children and let those children die of treatable conditions in the name of their invisible sky wizard.
They're not satisfied with piling up tax-free fortunes from tax-free donations and then using that money to put themselves into public office where they attack science and reason and facts in their name of their invisible sky wizard.
They're not satisfied with making the United States of America into an international laughingstock for letting freakazoids dictate our national policies.
No, now they want the public dollars to which they do not contribute a single dime.
Missouri’s Scrap Tire Grant Program
recycles tires and subsidizes non-profits to upgrade their playgrounds
with recycled rubber surfacing. Under the previous Democratic governor,
religious institutions were barred from the program. This meant that
Trinity Lutheran Church’s preschool could not receive a grant, but a
Montessori school would be eligible.
SNIP
Trinity
Lutheran argues that jungle gyms aren’t religious, and that excluding
parochial schools from public funding illegally penalizes them for their
religion. Their Christian kids are just as entitled to protection from
skinned knees as your heathen brats, right?
Opponents
argue that States have always had the right to exclude religious
institutions from public funding, and 39 states expressly outlaw it in
their Constitutions. For instance, Missouri’s Constitution says:
Neither the general assembly, nor any county, city, town, township, school district or other municipal corporation,
shall ever make an appropriation or pay from any public fund whatever,
anything in aid of any religious creed, church or sectarian purpose, or to help to support or sustain any private or public school, academy, seminary, college, university, or other institution of learning controlled by any religious creed, church or sectarian denomination whatever; (Art. IX, § 8)
Which seems pretty unambiguous, right?
There
is also a PLOT TWIST. The former Democratic governor of Missouri Jay
Nixon was replaced by Republican Eric Greitens, who is happy to disburse
state funds to religious institutions like it says in the Bible.
Under normal circumstances, that would mean that the case was moot —
Trinity would get its rubber playground, and the case would disappear.
But the Republican Attorney General has hired outside counsel to defend
the old law, on the theory that maybe one day a future Democratic
governor could reenact it. And if you think this reeks to high heaven,
YOU ARE RIGHT. Missouri has propped up a fake opponent so that Trinity
Lutheran and its adorable, skinned-knee toddlers can give us the magical
gift of public funding for religious schools forever. Hosanna!
The rich stopped paying yesterday. But they are still getting the max payout when they retire. When they retire on your taxes.
From Social Security Works:
This Thursday,
millionaires and billionaires will stop paying into Social Security. To
shine a spotlight on this unfair policy, Social Security Works is
joining with Social Security Champion Bernie Sanders for a national day
of action.
Right
now, the way we fund Social Security―a regressive practice that only
applies to the first $127,200 of a wage earner’s income―contributes to
wealth and income inequality in the U.S.
A millionaire won’t pay anything into our Social Security system for at least the last ten and a half months of the year.
This is because our Social Security system is primarily funded by
payroll contributions (or FICA). Once the FICA cap of $127,200 is
reached, millionaires and billionaires stop paying into the system,
while the vast majority of Americans continue to pay in on all of their
salary.
Social
Security benefits provide critical financial stability to seniors,
children, surviving spouses and veterans. It is outrageous that
Republicans―at the behest of their Wall Street backers―continue to call
for cuts to Social Security based on a future projected shortfall to the
trust fund when all we need is to ask millionaires and billionaires to pay their fair share!
Call Senator Mitch McConnell and Senator Rand Paul today: (202) 224-3121
Suggested call script:
My name is Lisa Aug and I live in Kentucky.
I am calling because for the rest of the year, millionaires and billionaires won’t pay into Social Security.
I
urge the Senator to support legislation that lifts the Social Security
payroll cap so that the wealthy pay their fair share into Social
Security all year--just like the rest of us.
Because
when they do, we’ll be able to extend the lifespan of the Social
Security Trust Fund and expand benefits for millions of Americans.
I urge the Senator to “scrap the cap” on Social Security payroll contributions. Thank you.
Thank you for standing with Social Security Works and Senator Bernie Sanders in our fight to protect and expand Social Security.
Negative credit rating. Negative. That's economic disaster territory.
Bevin refused to do anything about it during the 2016 budget session. Now he and his all-repug legislature can't do anything about it until next year. Meanwhile, Kentucky's sliding down the shitter.
A credit ratings agency fired a warning shot this week over Kentucky’s $32.6 billion public pension debt.
Standard
and Poor’s Global Ratings revised its outlook on Kentucky on Wednesday,
from stable to negative, ahead of an upcoming state bond sale. The
lowered outlook reflects at least a one-in-three likelihood that S&P
will lower the state’s credit ratings during the next two years, making
it more expensive for the state to borrow money, the agency said in a
statement.
“The outlook revision reflects our view that
funding levels of the commonwealth’s pension plans could significantly
weaken and associated fixed costs could continue to rise to a level that
might significantly pressure budgetary performance and flexibility,”
S&P analyst Timothy Little said.
Yes, the pension shortfall is the result of decades of administrations, mostly Democratic, stealing from the pension plan in order to fill budget holes without raising taxes.
But it's repugs whose whole raison d'etre is No Taxes. Now that they have control of all of Kentucky state government, they'll eliminate the pension system all together before they'll make the rich pay a fraction of their fair share of the taxes that hold the Commonwealth together.
Fine with you? State worker pensions are a significant source of income and economic growth in this state. Cancel that system and suddenly billions of dollars in consumer spending vanishes. Then the real budget slashing starts.
And then we're Somalia.
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article126347124.html#storylink=cpy
"Blue" in Blue in the Bluegrass refers to my politics, not my state of mind, although being progressive-democratic in Kentucky is not for the faint of heart.
The Bluegrass Region of Kentucky is Central Kentucky, the area around Lexington. It's also sometimes known as the Golden Triangle, the region formed by Louisville in the west, Cincinnati in the north and Lexington in the east-south corner. This is the most economically advanced, politically progressive and aesthically beautiful area of the state. Also the most overpopulated by annoying yuppies and the most endangered by urban sprawl.
A Yellow Dog Democrat is one who will vote for even a yellow dog if it is running as a Democrat. I can't claim to be quite that fanatically partisan, especially since quite a few candidates who run as Democrats in Kentucky are more Republican than a lot of Republicans I can name.
But I do love the story Kentucky House leader Rocky Adkins never tires of telling about the old-timer in Eastern Kentucky who was once accused of being willing to vote for Satan if Satan ran as a Democrat. Spat back the old-timer:
"Not in a primary, I wouldn't!"
Amen.
e
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