That’s Debatable:

A recent survey showed three in four Californians think the state’s headed in the wrong direction. The survey also showed a majority of Californians also favor Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s proposed tax increases, and most also favor a simple majority to approve budgets instead of the two-thirds majority that allows the GOP to block spending plans. Given this, what sort of tax increases, if any, could you live with?

None.

I understand voter frustration with Sacramento but raising taxes would be a temporary fix to a problem that has only one real solution — spending reform. We are not in our current position because Californians are “under-taxed” but because Sacramento has refused to address the problem — overspending. Sure, a tax increase seems like a quick fix but it is in no way the responsible solution. Raising taxes will do no more than buy Sacramento time for the public’s memory to fade so that when the next crisis hits Californians can again be asked to “do their part.”

Tom Harman

State Senator

(R-Huntington Beach)

California has been overspending for years, more than doubling state spending in the last decade.

Some lawmakers, both Republican and Democrat, have floated the idea of a simple majority to pass budgets. That some Republicans support this idea appears counterintuitive at first glance, but the theory is that a simple majority vote would confer full ownership of California’s budget problems to the Democrats by preventing Republicans from forcing a modicum of fiscal restraint from their minority position. This idea represents a high-stakes political gamble in the hope that Californians would soon tire of the Democrats’ unbridled tax and spend policies.

Chuck DeVore

Assemblyman

(R-Newport Beach)

Our problem isn’t that we have a broken process. It is that we have broken policies.

Average Californians don’t believe our economic challenges are because our taxes are not high enough — especially considering that they are already some of the highest in the nation.

California’s problem is the endless waste and massive overspending that has been going unchecked for a decade — and voters are tired of paying for Sacramento politicians’ overspending.

That is why I was encouraged to see that two-thirds of Californians support a spending cap to create a rainy day fund.

Californians deserve an efficient government in these difficult economic times.

Van Tran

Assemblyman