Speak Loud – Speak Now!

Opinion by Cindy Honcoop
State Director of Washington Eagle Forum

4/18/03

Olympia, WA - For years hard working citizens have had little time to ponder our state’s budget – we’ve been busy adjusting our lives and businesses to the aggressive demands of a relentless tax burden and insidious bureaucratic regulations.

Meanwhile, like teenagers with their first credit card, Governor Locke and his band of Democrat legislators, firmly in control of Olympia, have been on a spending binge building a straw house of bloated bureaucracy and passing the financial consequences of their spending on to the backs of the hard working citizens and business owners of our state.

Well, now their credit card is maxed out and their straw house is ready to topple, and citizens have no choice but to take note of what is happening in Olympia and to react – our very futures are at stake.

We face a huge budget deficit and our State is poised to spend 22.5 billion in the ’03-’05 budget cycle. That pencils out to be a legislative spending spree of an amazing $21,404 per minute – or $356.74 per second – for two years!

Reality is state spending is out of control and something has to give. We are in emergency mode here people, and any legislator who would even dare whisper the word “raise” in the same sentence as the word “tax” needs to be shown the door!

Governor Locke and your fellow democrats hear this:

  • Revenue doesn’t grow on trees – it is picked directly from the pockets of the working citizens of our state.
  • There isn’t a shortage of money in Olympia there is a shortage of restraint in spending.

  • Anti-business policies are causing businesses to flee our state at an alarming rate. We’ve lost 96,300 jobs since December 2000.

  • ANY proposed tax increase is an assault on every citizen’s ability to survive our state’s lagging economy.

  • The price of bureaucracy - 102,000 full time state employees and growing - is one business and tax payers can no longer bear.

  • It’s time to cut up the credit card.

The coming budget vote will separate the sheep from the goats, and working citizens will do well to note which legislators use their vote to raise taxes. What happens in Olympia affects each one of us, and nothing will change until “we the people” change it – from the top down. Call your legislators. Speak loud. Speak now. No new taxes!


Washington Eagle Forum is a conservative organization working in our state to influence public policy
on pro-family issues by informing and equipping citizens for action.
P.O. Box 205 Lynden, WA 98264
Phone: 360/354-8505
E-Mail: waeagles@juno.com
Web Page: www.waeagles.com



 

 

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