California’s Silent Big Spenders
Posted on May 28, 2009
Matt Welch
Editor’s note: This article was originally posted on Reason Online.
Say this much for the French: At least they have the couilles to come right out and argue why government needs to be bigger and more intrusive. I may not agree that the state should enforce "solidarity," or protect people from the alleged ravages of "hyper-capitalism," or promote national values to an increasingly blasé world, but at least these are concrete articulations of a positive government agenda, one that is buttressed by France’s semi-legendary (if slipping) public sector productivity.
You will hear no such arguments in California, even as a surly political/journalistic class continues its bitter campaign against "small government zealots" and voters who failed to heed their wisdom this month about the necessity of approving yet another round of budget gimmicks and tax hikes. Curiously, in the face of evidence that state spending growth has outpaced population-plus-inflation growth under each of the last three governors, the people busy sounding the alarm against "annihilating" budget cuts have fallen tellingly mute when it comes to explaining just why Californians should pay more and more money for government services every year.
What, exactly, has been the return on this added investment? If spending under Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger increased 6.75 percent a year during mostly good times, surely there must be, say, a 3 percent increase in the quantity or quality of…something? Crickets.
Instead of making the positive case for big government, or at least beginning to explain, let alone defend, what Sacramento does with all that money, California’s political class has instead opted for a four-pronged strategy: deny, scare, attack, then call for higher taxes.
First is the denial that there is a government-growth issue in the first place. This takes some intellectual dexterity, since the facts indicate otherwise.
Los Angeles Times business columnist Michael Hiltzik, for example, declared this week that the notion California had a spending problem was "an infectious myth." But Hiltzik was only able to arrive at that conclusion by not categorizing bond spending as "spending," and mis-measuring a 14 percent population increase over the past decade as 30 percent. An Los Angeles Times news article—with the objective headline "California budget crisis could bring lasting economic harm"—dismissed the big-government critique in two sentences: "Businesses have long complained about big-spending government in California. But with state and local spending accounting for about one-fifth of the state’s gross domestic product, California is in line with some other heavily populated, expensive-to-manage states, such as New York and Florida." Left out of that comparison (besides a more representative opposition than "businesses" who "complained") was an even bigger state than New York or Florida: Texas, where state and local spending is not "in line" with California at all.
The scare story is the easiest to tell, and sell. It requires no falsifying, no comprehensive analysis of state spending, just selected horror stories and numbers about the miserables left behind by a suddenly crippled state. "Poor would bear brunt of California budget cuts," the Los Angeles Times headlined one story. Commented the California progressive Robert Scheer, in a disbelieving TruthDig column on federal reluctance to bail out the Golden State: "Bail out the banks, but not the 500,000 poor families with children served by the CalWorks program, which will be dismantled, or the 928,000 children covered by the Healthy Families program, slated for oblivion."
Next, and most fun, comes the attack, mostly against that vanishing and largely impotent California tribe known as "Republicans." New York Times economic columnist Paul Krugman called the state GOP "the party of Rush Limbaugh," with members who "have become ever more extreme," yet with "enough seats in the Legislature to block any responsible action in the face of the fiscal crisis." Washington Post labor columnist and longtime L.A. hand Harold Meyerson said that "today’s GOP state legislators," when compared to the self-styled "Neanderthal" conservatives of the 1978 tax revolt, make "the Neanderthals look like Diderot’s Encyclopedists."
How is it possible to blame a spending-based budget crisis on the spending-averse minority party in an increasingly monolithic Democratic state? This is where the reeling political class actually senses an opportunity.
"The biggest obstacle of all," wrote Los Angeles Times Sacramento columnist George Skelton just after the election, "is the inane two-thirds majority vote requirement for passage of virtually any money bill—spending or taxes." That two-thirds requirement, along with a cap on property-tax increases for owners who hold onto their homes and businesses, was part of the landmark 1978 voter initiative Proposition 13.
"The truth is that real solutions to the budget crisis are obvious," Hiltzik wrote just after the election. "One: Eliminate, or at least loosen substantially, the two-thirds legislative requirement to pass a budget or raise taxes. [...] Three is the Big One: Revise Proposition 13. Prop 13 is often described as a tax-cutting measure, but that scarcely does justice to the damage it has caused."
Also singing in the Prop. 13-must-go chorus were Krugman, Meyerson, UC Irvine Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, the Los Angeles Times editorial board, The American Prospect‘s Tim Fernholz, and just about any newsroom employee you’ll run into. To a man, they’ll tell you that the initiative is responsible for "bringing the state to [its] knees in four decades," or in Meyerson’s florid verbiage, for having "reduced the Golden State to baser metal."
But if that analysis is true, then there is a natural follow-up question that none seem to ask: Why is it that the quality of government services is going down when the prices are going up? Snap intuition suggests that taxpayer dollars are being spent less efficiently each year. The more you spend on waste, the less you can spend on those 928,000 children.
Though there are far fewer zero-sum contests in economics than most people think, the battle over taxpayer dollars is definitely one of them. Every California worried about service cuts should take a very close look at state-sector pension contributions and the sweetheart contracts negotiated by the public sector unions that aren’t even apologetic about helping run the state’s finances into the ground.
It’s only a suspicion, but my guess is that the main reason pro-spending commenters and legislators don’t regale us with defenses of the virtuous State is that in their hearts they know it isn’t true. If Sacramento is providing boffo services, it isn’t immediately evident in the places where non-welfare-recipient Californians are most likely to encounter them: On the clogged highways, in the crappy public schools, at the local DMV. If the stuff we don’t normally see is being delivered with increasingly better results, that’s the kind of story that might begin to persuade skeptical Californians. But that’s precisely the story that the state’s political class won’t—or can’t—tell.
Matt Welch is editor in chief of Reason.
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By DHFabian, July 24 at 7:13 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
”—deny, scare, attack, then call for higher taxes.”
Report thisWell yes, of course. We experimented with this strategy on tobacco, and it has proved to be stunningly successful. I realized just how successful one day when I saw two young women, standing behind an idling car—breathing in the carcinogenic exhaust fumes—berating a passer-by for smoking a cigarette. We know we’ve tipped over the edge of sanity when soldiers sent to kill and die on battlefields are prohibited from smoking! But this really has nothing to do with health/smoking, everything to do with “enhancing govt. revenues”.
By ejay, June 16 at 2:09 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
How did you folks let this moron Virginia get away with her (I’ll be polite) dissembling? Oh, yeah, all kinds of money going in to Reason and its foundation, Virginia, so much they barely make ends meet, for Pete’s sake. And you castigate them for publishing information from the public record? The government employee pensions are completely outrageous and thoroughly indefensible. The California government is a perfect example of left-wing lunacy, almost as wacky as your thinking that having a few websites, and that expensive-sounding “tv” domain, means they own a broadcasting studio or some such nonsense. It is YOUR foundations on the loony left that have the George Soros and Bill Gates and Warren Buffett money. Reason has a lot of small contributors, and not enough large ones. PAW, MoveOn, etc., have the opposite ratio—big Teresa Heinz and Soros bucks, for the most part. Come back after you’ve read a little Adam Smith, Ricardo, Hayek, et al. Actually, I’d love to get a Murray Rothbard treatise into your hands. If, in fact, you even understood it, it would make you so crazy your head would probably explode! Scratch that. From reading your posts, that has apparently already happened.
Report thisBy mandinka, June 4 at 1:31 pm #
Gosh right wing crack pots?? CA has been a Blue state for more than 20 years. So what you are really saying is that the neo communists in CA are unable to get the majority of the population to see the light.
Report thisThat’s what happens when you allow everyone to vote, far better to have only 1 party, state run media to insure your message gets out.
Where do you plan on putting your Gulags??
By Virginia777, June 3 at 7:51 pm #
The “foolishness” we need to end, is that of right-wing, anti-tax ideologues who have made it impossible to govern the state, as another commentator says:
“Basically, it’s become impossible to govern the state because anti-government types have totally bamboozled the public with crackpot initiatives and false promises.”
“What we have is a situation in which Grover Norquist types have succeeded in literally drowning California in the wake of their single-minded tax-cut proposals that aren’t tied to any agenda of budget cuts.”
Report thisBy mandinka, June 2 at 8:54 pm #
Virginia are you saying that FOI only exists for newspapers and left wing idelogs like Greenpeace, Sierra Club etal?
Report thisIf a taxpayer wants to see where their money is going and being spent then why shouldn’t have access to these records? Afraid that the taxpayers might just say enough is enough and we need to end this foolishness!!!
By Virginia777, June 2 at 6:48 pm #
These California vigilantes, persecute pensioners??
and “mandinka” thinks this is “ok”? typical anti-government indoctrination. These right-wing websites are using the PRA to obtain information on Government workers and schools, and then publishing it and using it for harassment and defamation.
Report thisBy mandinka, June 2 at 4:01 pm #
The good news here is that “reason” is all over the waste in CA spending so that the taxpayers can really start a recall. To think that someone who worked in education or any state or local position could retire with a pension over 4100K is ridiculous.
Report thisIts about time the CA taxpayers see how out of whack the spenders are, rather than control the excess the solution is to take away healthcare. How about these pensions for prison guards cops etc with a huge majority going out on disability and not paying any taxes
By Virginia777, June 2 at 11:50 am #
and check out what the “Reason Foundation” is up to,
this is from their blog entitled “Out of Control Policy Blog”,
they are giving out the names of Pensioners to all their readers in this inflammatory post:
“California Budget Insanity: Education Pension Edition
Lisa Snell
June 1, 2009, 4:54pm
The California Foundation for Fiscal Responsibility (CFFR) has obtained and posted “The CalSTRS $100,000 Pension Club” — a list of more than 3,000 retired educators who are receiving pensions of $100,000 or more per year. You can access the list in PDF here.”
http://reason.org/blog/show/1007675.html
Report thisWelcome to California’s inane media!!
By Virginia777, June 2 at 11:11 am #
These commentators are proving my point.
California is in the mess it is in, I believe, because too many of its Liberals confuse Liberal with Libertarian.
California’s liberals need to Wake Up, quickly, and confront this assault of misinformation in publications like “Reason” here, and get the Truth back out there.
If that can happen, this idiot Matt Welch, who had the nerve to attack Robert Scheer on Truthdig, has done us all a big favor here.
Report thisBy Big Jess, June 1 at 3:55 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Let’s set a few people straight:
1. No, property taxes were not capped 25 years ago. What happened when Prop 13 passed was that:
a) Property tax assessments were returned to their 1975 level and the rate set at 1% of assessed value.
b) From then on, the assessed value rises 2% a year. This 2% does not include add-ons for voter-approved special districts—water, parks, sanitation, etc.—and for voter-approved bonds including school bonds.’
c) Whenever the property is sold, or whenever the property is remodeled to add square footage, the property is reassessed. (At sale, to 1% of the new sales price; when remodeled, by the valuation of the new construction.)
2. Prop 13 was NOT based on a lie. I know, because my mother was one of those people who faced being taxed out of her house. Prop 13 based by an overwhelming margin.
3. Prop 13 did not bankrupt the state or local cities, counties, and school districts. Adjusted for both inflation and population growth, CA government has now, and has had for decades, more money than it had before Prop 13.
4. Even the L.A. County Tax Assessor has praised Prop 13 because the constant 2% annual increase in assessed value provides an ever-increasing revenue floor even during recessions. (Don’t believe, look it up. Article was in the L.A. Times last year.)
5. Caliornia residents suffer under the highest combined tax rate (prop, sales, income, excise, estate, vehicle regis, etc.) of all 50 states. (Having recently edged past NJ for that dubious honor.)
6. Like NY and many other states, one of CA’s big problems is that the top state income tax rate kicks in at $41K. So the average two-income middle class family pays state income taxes at the same rate as, oh say, Kobe Bryant, Steven Spielberg, and the titans of Silicon Valley. $41K or $41mil, you pay at the same rate.
7. CA overpays public employee pensions (90% of final salary plus annual COLA plus lifetime health care) and way overpays prison guards (most powerful union in the state, by far).
8. If you listen to the Democrats in the Legis the problem is that CA is too dependent on fluctuating tax sources LIKE THE INCOME TAX. Gee, our problem is that we rely on taxes which are tied to a person’s rising (or falling) income and not just guaranteed to give the state the same amount of money every year?! Who knew!? (BTW, I’m a lifelong—disgruntled—registered Democrat.)
Report thisBy Leefeller, May 31 at 10:06 pm #
Why do I find this article lacking in substance? Guess the only point was to say people should repeal proposition 13 and eliminate the 2/3 vote in congress?
Seems that could have been stated in two or even one sentence.
Naming ones organization “Reason”, does not require them to use it, all ones needs to do is have cards printed. “I am the voice of Reason”. As the article seems to lack in the use of reason, maybe it would be more enlightened to call themselves “Bcause”!
It would be nice to know who is Bankrolling outfits like these guys. For me, calling themselves “Reason” promotes suspicions. What is their real intent, to actually say something and support specific ideals or just muddy the waters?
Special interests and lobbies have been known to do these kinds of things and sometimes they get caught. Several years back the Republicans created a bogus group which seemed what it was not. Don’t know why they had to do that, they never seem to be what they are anyway?
Report thisBy BobZ, May 31 at 12:07 am #
“You need to decide who are you angry about. The writer is angry at union members and the poor. I am angry at the Wall Street Bankers who have enriched themselves.”
The GOP spent decades on programs to villify unions, make CEO’s into celebrities, and put down poor people. Through sheer will they have mostly succeeded, until recently. Still there seems to be a real reticence by Republican’s to blame Wall Street for the substantial losses they and Democrats have incurred in the last year. I know several baby boomers close to retirement who have lost half of their 401k savings in a single year. The problems the state of California is having pale in comparison to people who now can’t retire on the timetable they originally planned.
Report thisBy Virginia777, May 29 at 9:47 pm #
Matt Walsh (who has the nerve to bash Paul Krugman) is the editor in chief of the “Reason” based guess where,
Los Angeles, California.
In their About Us section: “Reason provides a refreshing alternative to right-wing and left-wing opinion magazines by making a principled case for liberty and individual choice in all areas of human activity”
Oh, Libertarians. Very popular in CA, and very prone to right-wing ideology here.
Has anyone checked out this “Reason” website? They have Reason t.v., Reason.com AND a Reason magazine.
Someone is pumping a LOT of money into this so-called “Reason” enterprise,
which is obviously up to no good.
Report thisBy dcampbell, May 29 at 8:17 pm #
This post is misleading. Harold Meyerson in the Washington Post has a good essay on the appropriate responses to this budget crisis.
First. You need to recognize that the California budget crisis is a result of the national bank crisis-ripoff. You need to decide who are you angry about. The writer is angry at union members and the poor. I am angry at the Wall Street Bankers who have enriched themselves.
Second, 44 out of 50 states have a budget crisis. California budget is bigger- so the crisis is bigger.
Immediate responses;
1. Eliminate the 2/3 vote rule for taxes.
Report this2. Pass the split roll, or commercial property so they can pay their share.
3. Eliminate the the 2/3 vote rule for budgets. Let democracy work.
By jjohnjj, May 29 at 5:15 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Good summary from OldManCA
I would add that the annual budget BRINKSMANSHIP practiced by the Republican minority in our Legislature PREVENTS fiscal responsibility.
We should run our budgets on a two year cycle, and seek revenue from stable sources (income taxes, not “sin” taxes).
We pay a lot of expensive overtime to police, fire, and healthcare professionals because of the chaos in Sacramento prevents the cities and counties from filling vacancies.
Report thisBy mandinka, May 29 at 5:11 pm #
I’ve signed on and out a couple of times just to make sure I’m on Truthdig, an oxymoron if ever there was one.
Report thisIsn’t amazing that the left keeps saying that the problem with CA is prop 13. Isn’t it amazing that a grass initiated activity that was VOTED on by the great unwashed is the problem. Not spending, not the unions, not illegals and the solution is more spending and more taxes.
Liberals just can’t understand that the public voted on the tax package and the great unwashed again said no.
I guess the majority of the legal citizens are just too stupid to vote and process needs to be taken from them
By OldManCA, May 29 at 4:47 pm #
Conservative, but not a Rush rant, so I am okay with it being here. It does stimulate me to think conservative.
Three points:
1) Prop 13 was based on a lie - that there were thousands of retirees being forced out of their homes and that Prop 13 was the only solution. You cannot find any evidence that the problem existed other than a couple of weepy stories, and even if it were real, there were plenty of other ways to resolve it without giving the big commercial property owners such a gift.
2) The state budget IS out of whack. In the late ‘90s when the economy was booming the fools in Sacramento increased spending on pensions and on new programs, as if the dot com bubble was the beginning of a new age. Any program enacted 1998 - 2009 should have to justify its existence, or close.
3) Government wages and benefits have out-grown the economy. It used to be that a government job did not pay as well as one in the private sector, but was secure and had reasonable benefits. However, for the last 20-30 years there has been a movement to raise government wages closer to the private sector, AND to keep the cushy pension benefits. Private employers no longer have pension programs - only 401k plans, and then any matching the employer does is optional. But government employees have real pensions.
4) The Prison Guards Union is a powerful and nasty bunch, who, with the help of prison construction companies, have turned our state into the land of the incarcerated. Shameful and sinful.
5) Unions for government employees have a power advantage that needs to be reigned in. No elected official cares to negotiate toughly because it is unpopular, and due to term limits they won’t be around when the real cost comes due anyway. Also, unlike a private business, an over-reaching union is still unlikely to be able to kill off its employer. In the private sector if the union gets to much, the employer may go under—see Chrysler and GM. But if the Prison Guards get even more money, so what, the state won’t close the prisons.
The solution to California’s woes? A Constitutional convention to:
1 - get rid of term limits,
2 - get rid of the 2/3 rds vote requirements,
3 - get rid of fixed “guaranteed” funding for any program,
4 - make sure legislative districts are not drawn by the legislature,
5 - make strikes by government employees illegal, or enact some other method to limit the power of government employee unions
Result - Elected Officials who will be required to work, Voters who will have to pay attention and turn out those who do not work.
Funding - reinstate the automobile personal property tax (it is deductible on federal taxes so it serves as a tax shift back to California)
Report thisCreate a lobbying license fee equal to 10% of whatever the lobbyist is paid;
Enact an oil extraction tax - Texas and Alaska both do quite nicely, we give it away.
By BobZ, May 29 at 1:23 pm #
Geez, how did this right wing commentary get in Truthdig? It looks more appropriate for Townhall.com. That aside, the article is as full of vague statements and inflammatory rhetoric as the articles it attacks. There is one fundamental truth about California’s decline since the 1970’s and that is the passage of Prop. 13, and the dramatic impact it had on California’s infrastructure, both state and local. A major flaw in the proposition was the huge tax break given corporations on their property taxes, and the necessity to get a 60% approval to get a budget passed. This allows a small minority to hold the rest of the state hostage. Yes our schools are now on a par with Mississipi’s and only through massive support by wealthy parents can the schools survive in wealthy districts. A college education was supposed to be free in California if you went to one of the public colleges or universities. That is no longer true and hasn’t been since the 1970’s. Our roads are falling apart and our prison costs are higher than our education costs, because of the three strikes ruling. We have way too many people in prison in this state because of minor infractions and too many prison guards to guard them. We are burdening our health care facilities with people who don’t have health care and are relying on the most expensive emergency room care that the rest of us have to pay for in higher health care premiums. We need massive health care reform in California and the rest of the country. We have a legislature in California that is hamstrung by all of the referandums passed by voters that are too often contradictary and restrict what the legislature can do in hard economic times. But our problems are solvable if we can bring politicians together of good will who are not tied into ideologies that rule out any practical solutions requiring compromise. If all of our legislators just gave a little on their hard line stances, we could get out of this mess. We elect these people to office and then try and prevent them from doing their jobs. That is just dumb. If anything it is we the citizens of this great state who are dysfunctional. Articles like the one published in Truthdig do us all a disservice - it doesn’t do much good to go around bashing people but offer up no solutions.
Report thisBy rollzone, May 29 at 12:51 pm #
hello. higher taxes for unnecessary programs. $11 billion in state tax revenue, and they lie that is not enough. how dare they spend $1billion on programs and pretend that is not enough? $11billion worth of mismanagement and waste: and they want more. i say execute the politicians. eliminate the government excesses and bureaucratic growth. terminate the spenders that are bankrupting the children and grandchildren of the future generation.
Report thisBy moe, May 29 at 12:47 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
I read that property tax rates were capped some 25 yrs ago and never changed even when property values increased. Maybe it is time to change that.
Report thisBy Virginia777, May 29 at 12:40 pm #
Who can possibly have a “closed mind” to Right-wing propaganda? (these days)
Its “only” been all around us, in every Media vehicle (including the “alternative” ones),
do you really think this article is offering anything new here? we have heard these arguments a thousand times,
they have been shoved down California’s throat.
Report thisBy Marshall K, May 29 at 11:14 am #
Even though I disagree with a lot of this article, I do think there is a place for alternate commentaries on this site.
Report thisOne of the problems with the net is people seeking out sites that only reinforce our beliefs. It is good for all of us to look at alternative opinions, because guess what—we are not always right, even if we think so.
A closed mind is a terrible thing.
By xypher, May 29 at 11:06 am #
The American Public, by and large, are an ignorant bunch of dolts easily swayed by Right-Wing Extremist Propaganda that means to do them harm under the guise of small government.
Education is the first program Republicans consistently cut. And our free much doesn’t exactly give us the headlines we need to be informed and take action at the voting booth.
Report thisBy LAR, May 29 at 10:11 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
I moved to CA from MA five years ago. I bought a townhouse in Alameda. I pay $11000 in property taxes a year. My neighbor, original owner of an identical townhouse, pays $1200 a year. That’s Prop 13 and once the 20-40 year olds figure out why they can’t afford a home, it will change.
Then there is 3 strikes sponsored and sold by the prison industries and guard unions. Solution: legalize, regulate and tax grass—the true grass roots revolution.
Report thisBy KISS, May 29 at 9:20 am #
In my view unions are the same as corporations. The members are screwed by the elite same as stockholders are screwed by the board.
Report thisMeasure 13 brought some sanity to raising taxes and that was endangering home-ownership by the lower and middle class. Is Matt Welch a hack for the repugs? I don’t know and I do disagree on the free trade BS.
PERs is the downfall of many states, the fix is easy but with ” No Guts, No glory ” legislatures nothing will get the fix needed.
Lee Iaccoca said it long a go: Make retirement age 65 and not before, or, Hire only 30 year olds. Paying double for one job is plain DUM!
By Marshall, May 29 at 1:32 am #
Why are so many of you afraid of opposing viewpoints? Isn’t liberalism about tolerance? If you disagree with the point of view, you’re free to respond with actual arguments supporting yours. Or do you just prefer that this site continue to preach to the choir?
I’m as surprised as you about why they posted this, but my guess is that as a result of losing out to Huffpost on the recent website award, TD has realized they need to mix it up a bit with opposing points of view. I say good on’ya!
Report thisBy Virginia777, May 29 at 12:50 am #
I’m scared.
This Matt Welch has scammed his way onto Truthdig, with the standard Republican rant, i.e. that ineffective government is the sole cause of California’s problems. He even minimizes the damage of Proposition 13!
This illogic of this, did not phase the Truthdig editor that posted this, because,
this comes from yet another trendy National blog that purports itself to be progressive, this one is called “Reason” (even though it is anything but).
Look at their subhead: “Reason is the monthly print magazine of “free minds and free markets.”
Free minds AND free markets? what is this publication?
“Reason and Reason Online are editorially independent publications of the Reason Foundation, a national, non-profit research and educational organization.”
This group sounds huge, and obviously, has a right-wing bent.
why are they putting their propaganda up on Truthdig?
Report thisBy K, May 29 at 12:31 am #
Why is this article on Truthdig? If I wanted to read this drivel then I could go to the LA Times, Fox News, or AM radio.
Articles by Krugman, Scheer, and even the Economist are much better.
Come on Truthdig, what’s going on?
Report thisBy Virginia777, May 28 at 8:33 pm #
Who wrote this piece of propaganda??
“the sweetheart contracts negotiated by the public sector unions” Anti-union sentiment runs high in California and is a cause of her troubles. Here we find it in this article.
“the crappy public schools” NO! California has good public schools despite the fact that the State spends a ridiculously low amount on them. Its just that yuppies don’t like to send their kids to them.
AGAIN, we see public schools and unions bashed in the media (this time on Truthdig). How convenient that they are bearing the brunt of the cuts, make no one care via mass media propaganda (like this piece).
This faulty, selfish logic is the cause of all of our misery and it is very disturbing to find it on Truthdig.
Report thisBy Marshall, May 28 at 8:28 pm #
OMG - Was the Reports section editor stoned and let this one slip through or what? I’m gaining respect for Truthdig that it publishes such an article (and even critical of its editor, rober scheer!) Congrats to TD!
Report this