Reel Cowboy wrote:Mojo, you're just not getting it.
Private industry is, by and large, more adept at running with in a budget due to the fact that they HAVE TO TURN A PROFIT to keep the doors open.
Yeah, exactly! I mean, look at Goldman Sachs, American Express, GMAC, AIG, Farmers and Merchants Bank, Columbia Banking, Ameris, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Chrystler and GM!
In my opinion (as if anyone really cares) drug testing wellfare recipients is a noble idea, but we will just have to wait and see what sort of difference it will really make. The mandatory "random" drug screening for state workers does seem a little bit over the line to me. They already have the authority to test someone who is suspected of drug use, so why waste 20 bucks a pop on mandatory quarterly drug tests for 1,000's of state workers every year when we're really supposed to be cutting the budget?
I don't know about you guys, but when my wife makes more money, it benefits me. I don't care whether the interest in Solantic is in his name or his wife's name, it's a conflict of interest.
As much as I hate it (as a government employee on the state retirement system), I hate to see an extra 3% of my salary going to be paid in addition to what the state was already paying on my behalf. In other words, (and this is the part most people seem to miss) the state is not reducing the amount of money it puts into my pension, they are simply requiring me to pay an additional 3% on top of it, without increasing the benefits. In fact, many of the benefits were cut.
This isn't cutting the state budget, this is increasing state revenue (specifically for the FRS). He has managed to raise taxes on people who subscribe to the state retirement system (which includes local city & county employees plus all the state workers), while making it look like a budget cut.
I'll admit that he's a genius, but that makes him no less shady.
The gods do not deduct from man's allotted span the hours spent in fishing. ~Babylonian Proverb