The Arizona Sentinel

So what do we do ? Well the choices are simple. We must have leadership that is willing to make the hard decisions. 

We must shut down all financial cost to the state due to Federal mandates,.. That right, Medicaid, Education, Transportation and the list goes on. We must stop subsidizing colleges and universities. If you want tuition rates to go down, stop giving them money. And make them stand on their own. Same with all these Junior colleges around the state. If they can not stay afloat on the revenues they generate,. They close. Trust me their tuitions will go down and they will be more competitive.

Second we must reduce the size and scope of the State government. That means every agency across the board must be downsized 40-50%.

Legacy costs, on all current and former government employees must see a haircut. 15-20%. State must enter a 3 year hiring freeze. All government non essential vehicles should be parked and sold at auction. Equipment purchases should be frozen for 3 years. Travel by state employees must be frozen for 3 years.

In short , every line item in the AZ budget will need to be reduced by 30-40%.

Seems drastic doesn’t it. But lets look at some facts.

Tthe Arizona state budget was exploded by a number of methods.

A governor that drove state costs in the tank , by creating unsustainable social programs. By a governor that failed to secure her borders, allowing millions of illegals to flood into the state , sucking the economic life blood (money) from the state. Add to that the housing debacle. Arizona and indeed the country until the summer of 2007 were living in a completely false economy , caused by the federal government, Wall Street and banks that crossed state lines , took cash flow and converted it to unearned salaries, commissions and bonuses. Remember folks , Wall street makes money when the folks on the street lose or if they can sell something to somebody that has no intrinsic value, no equity, such as no net worth backing home loans. And for all you Arizonans that are still asleep, eventually you will realize that the destruction to your state ,your economy and your freedoms was all intentional because we did not pay attention to those we elected.

We must do everything possible, to bring industry back into the state. Government must back off and allow this to happen. Who ever is your next Governor must be willing to generate signing statements declaring that Arizona will take no part in any trade policy related to Nafta and Cafta. 

The one thing Obama has done right , was to put tariffs on Chinese made tires. He said he would end Nafta, he needs to get it done. The federal government has borrowed billions from China and thrown it in the wind. They announced a 3-5 % GDP gain on Thursday,. But that gain was generated not from equity in America. But by borrowing from china. The gain is not sustainable because the money was throw at government workers including teachers . Non of which produces anything that can be sold.

The states must by regions step up , and create a economic environment that gives people economic confidence going forward.

Now lets look at what needs to be done with tax policies.

We need to remove property taxes on all personal primary residences. What would that do . It would immediately encourage growth In Arizona. The money that would be brought into Arizona by the millions of baby boomers would be staggering. Think about it as long as you are paying property taxes on a your home , you never own it,. Your just renting it from the government. Given that many of those would be bringing billions of retirement savings and revenue with them.  They would buy up all these vacant, foreclosed new and used homes sitting around the state. Why some other state hasn’t done this is mind boggling.

Now you say, well what would that do to education. Frankly it would be the best thing in the world for government run public miseducation.

Im told that 70% of property tax dollars goes to education.

So if we remove all the residential  property tax from the system,. That would starve out the teachers unions, legacy costs due to pensions, it would send the money generated from Commercial property directly to the students,and while Im on commercial property a subject near and dear to my heart, commercial property taxes should be taken back to the 1998 or earlier levels.  And of course since we have fewer dollars to work with , we will be forced to stop attempting to educate illegal aliens. We will need less teachers,but better teachers,fewer teachers aids, school nurses, school police officers and the list goes on and on.

We have to have leadership that will support state law and remove illegals from our states cost burden. Our Governor must stand firm in support of our County Sheriffs. All of them.

We  must remove the illegals from Arizona. States all across America are being bankrupt , due to the cost of crime resulting from open borders. Now I have to say here though, if you come to the border, apply for a work permit, have a legitimate sponsor, submit to a background check, and a physical exam.  They could be given a 6 month work visa, providing they are not pregnant or inflicted with some other medical issue. Then they would be required to leave the state for a minumum of 3 months. Coming into Arizona and delivering a child will get you sent back to Mexico. Regardless of your country of origin.

 We need to close half of our prisons.,, Release any and all prisoners that are incarcerated for non violent crimes. Release them and require them to do community service work, such as , clean up the trash in the desert, along the state highways,. Send them to the forest to clean up the underbrush, remove the trees and vegetation growing in the what used to be creeks and streams.

We must return the operational control of all currently federal managed lands back to the state of Arizona. The timber industry, and mining must be revitalized.

We must eliminate all franchise and , business taxes,.. Workers comp and benefits must be rolled back. Get out of the road of business growth. When we shifted from a agriculture and manufacturing based economy, our days were numbered. Housing should have never been a economic indicator. Agriculture, Manufacturing and Commercial real estate are the true indicators of an economy. Housing was shoved into first place because of government intervention, creating a false, base line. That line had nothing holding it up.

I will sign any bill that eliminates state income taxes and property taxes on primary residences.

I would stop the practice of sending taxes on highway fuel to the Federal Treasury,. That money is generated here and needs to stay here and pay down the debt. And then should be reinvested in Arizona not in Iraq, Afghanistan or Congressional pay raises.

Create a statute that says that any group, special interest that brings a lawsuit on the state. Must put up a One million dollar cash bond with the state to cover any unintended consequences from any issue brought before a court.

And finally , we must stop investing state money outside of the state. Once we have a balance budget and the state again has a budget surplus , those dollars should stay right here in Az. Invest in business, infrastructure, home schooling, and so on. We should never invest in any thing tied to contributing to any kind of legacy cost. Such as union pensions, teacher pensions and so on.

The Federal Reserve, the Treasury , will only kick the can down the road,. We must have a plan with in the states. Depending on the beltway will go nowhere.

And finally , we must sever our financial ties with Washington DC. Money created within the states stays with in the state, money created by Washington thru international trade , shipping and tariffs, well they can have it. We must be able to invest in our local banks, they invest in our local community , the banks pay a reasonable rate to depositors and they charge a reasonable rate to investors. We must end the practice of branch banks across state lines. The depositors money winds up in Wall street. Keep your banks close and your money closer.

Wall Streeters continue to say that there is still billions of dollars sitting on the side lines,.. They are right,. Those dollars are waiting for a place to go and grow,.. But it wont be Wall Street any time soon. The recent gains were hype do to the cash for clunkers,. that’s over,. By the way the real cost to the taxpayers was 24 thousand per unit sold,.. Sounds like a great deal to me.

The money on the sidelines will emerge once the state economies start to show some positive signs,. But as long as the Fed keeps the interest rates at artificially low rates,. Private investment dollars will remain in the mattress. So again, its up to the states.

The Fed is keeping the rates down , because it generats more revenue for the Treasury. Here’s how , the lower your mortgage rate, the less you claim as a home mortgage interest  credit on your 1040. Therefore your taxable income goes up. I submit until interest rates, across the board go up , the economy will remain stagnate,flat and going no where. The government needs to let the market create the interest rate. In 1993 when Allen Greenspan started driving rates down, he created the systemic conditions that assisted us in getting where we are today.