[ilbegone]

Maybe then for Republicans to compete against the Democrats in California it would be necessary to toss out more freebies than Democrats.

Logic is that people who vote for more taxes will tend to be either people who don't pay taxes or whose lifestyle wouldn't be altered by paying those extra taxes.

Again, it is logical that those who receive social services would support politicians who dole out social services. So, who is more likely to receive social services?

According to Assemblyman Roy Ashburn in 1997 when times were much better

Take a hard look at the following, frightening statistics:

* Of the 2.6 million people in California now on welfare, 1996-97 grants will total $6 billion.
* California has more people on welfare than 20 states have people.
* California accounts for 28 percent of all money spent nationwide on the AFDC program. Yet, we have only 12 percent of the nation's population.
* California has 38 percent of the nation's legal immigrants on welfare. Fourteen percent of those on welfare in California are illegal immigrants.

California's working families can no longer subsidize a broken, self-perpetuating system that wastes billions of their dollars every year. The "war on poverty" should have been called a "war on family."

There's only so much tax revenue to be appropriated.

According to Investor's Daily in November 2010:

The 'Golden State' Still Doesn't Get It

Posted 11/04/2010 07:10 PM ET

States: The midterm elections turned into a sweeping repudiation of the Democrats' failed status quo — except, that is, in California. There, not only did the Democrats not lose, they gained clout.

Even as voters in other states said they'd had enough of ever bigger, more intrusive and higher-cost government by the Democrats, California voters said, "More please."

With the exception of the governor's office, California has been a virtual one-party state since the 1960s. Now, thanks to decades of anti-business policies promulgated by a series of left-leaning legislatures, its economy and finances are a mess, and it's hemorrhaging jobs, businesses and productive entrepreneurs to other states.

The pattern continued on Tuesday, when voters rehired 1970s Democratic gubernatorial retread Jerry Brown and rejected moderate Republican and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina for far-left, five-term incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer.

How bad has it gotten in the erstwhile Golden State? Consider:

• Some 2.3 million Californians are without jobs, for a 12.4% unemployment rate — one of the highest in the country.

• From 2001 to 2010, factory jobs plummeted from 1.87 million to 1.23 million — a loss of 34% of the state's industrial base. Ask any company, and it'll tell you the same thing: It's now almost impossible to build a big factory in California.

• With just 12% of the U.S. population, California has almost a third of the nation's welfare recipients. Some joke the state motto should be changed from "The Golden State" to "The Welfare State." Meanwhile, 15.3% of all Californians live in poverty.

• The state budget gap for 2009-10 was $45.5 billion, or 53% of total state spending — the largest in any state's history.

• The state's sales tax is the nation's highest, and its income tax the third-highest, the BusinessInsider.com Web site recently noted. Meanwhile, the Tax Foundation's "State Business Tax Climate Index" ranks California 48th.

• In a ranking by corporate relocation expert Ronald Pollina of the 50 states based on 31 factors for job creation, California finished dead last.

• In another ranking, this one by the Beacon Hill Institute on state competitiveness, California came in 32nd — down seven spots in just one year.

• California is home to 25% of America's 12 million to 20 million illegal immigrants. A 2004 study estimated that illegals cost the state's citizens $10.5 billion a year — roughly $1,200 per family.

• Unfunded pension liabilities for California's state and public employees may be as much as $500 billion — roughly 17% of the nation's total $3 trillion at the state and local level.

Ok, let's compete with Democrats.