Speaker 1: What the hell is it? Controller? Anyway, it's Armstrong and
Speaker 1: Getty extra large because four hours simply isn't enough. This
Speaker 1: is Armstrong and Getty extra large. When we found out
Speaker 1: a friend of ours is running for state controller in California,
Speaker 1: I thought, well, he'd be great at that. Whatever that is?
Speaker 1: Um is controller different than controllers? I believe it's the
Speaker 1: same thing, roughly, but perhaps lanh chen knows you know
Speaker 1: him from the Armstrong and Getty Show. Lani chenned David
Speaker 1: and Diane Stuffy fellow, an American public policy Studies at
Speaker 1: the Uver Institution, Director Domestic Policy Studies at Stanford University,
Speaker 1: frequent guest on cable TV, and now the officially announced
Speaker 1: candidate for controller in the state of California. Hello, Lon, Hey,
Speaker 1: how are you? It is great to be with you, gentlemen.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Can you answer the initial question of his
Speaker 1: controller and control are the same thing? And what is
Speaker 1: one of them? Yeah? So in California we call it
Speaker 1: a controller. In New York City they call it a comptroller.
Speaker 1: In different states they call it different things. I think
Speaker 1: the concept is basically the same, which is, you need
Speaker 1: to have somebody who watches over the money that a
Speaker 1: state or local entity is spending us very similar to
Speaker 1: a corporate context that the controller is responsible for essentially
Speaker 1: auditing outbound spending, is responsible for accounting for that. Um,
Speaker 1: we can get into this a little bit more. The
Speaker 1: California State controllers powers and responsibilities are actually even broader
Speaker 1: than that. But at base, this job is about accountability,
Speaker 1: it's about independence, it's about prudence, and those are all
Speaker 1: things that I think I can bring to this job,
Speaker 1: and that's why I'm really excited to take this step
Speaker 1: in in my in my journey. Can I ask you
Speaker 1: an unrelated question, just briefly, Do we get to talk
Speaker 1: to you anymore about the issues of the day or
Speaker 1: do you have to kind of keep your nose clean
Speaker 1: since you're running for office? Well, uh, you know, it's
Speaker 1: certainly in issues relating to California. You know, I'm I'd
Speaker 1: love to talk about those kinds of things and figure out, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, how I can weigh in, But I'm going
Speaker 1: to be pretty focused on this race and pretty focused
Speaker 1: on commenting on issues that have pertinence to this race
Speaker 1: in this office. So fair enough, so, would the controller
Speaker 1: be the one that says to the state, Hey, he's
Speaker 1: spending all this money on the bullet train is a
Speaker 1: bad idea, or like, like, what what issues might regular
Speaker 1: voters in California be aware of the controllers sticking their
Speaker 1: nose into. Yeah, so, so to back up for a second,
Speaker 1: we have a really interesting structure for accountability in California.
Speaker 1: We have someone called the California State Auditor, who is
Speaker 1: not actually the controller. The auditor can investigate items at
Speaker 1: the request of the legislature. So, for example, you know,
Speaker 1: many of of your listeners will have heard about this
Speaker 1: unemployment insurance fiasco we have in California where essentially fraudulent
Speaker 1: checks went out, the biggest, biggest fraud in California state history,
Speaker 1: thirty billion dollars with a b billion dollars. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: you know, the auditor has done some great reporting on
Speaker 1: you know, here's what went wrong, here's why it went wrong.
Speaker 1: So you may ask, well, if you've got an auditor,
Speaker 1: what do you need the controller for the answer is,
Speaker 1: the controller has independent authority to audit any state or
Speaker 1: local agency if they're spending state money for any reason
Speaker 1: at all, at any time. So the controller doesn't need
Speaker 1: someone else's permission to go in and look at a
Speaker 1: program life unemployment insurance, like the high speed Whale authority,
Speaker 1: like the state medical system, like in home supportive services,
Speaker 1: basically any system that you can think of, any state
Speaker 1: system or even localities. In fact, the controller has to
Speaker 1: conduct regular audits of school districts and how school districts
Speaker 1: are spending their money. So the great thing about the
Speaker 1: controller's office, the thing that excites me, is the ability
Speaker 1: to go in and essentially shed light on all sorts
Speaker 1: of different things that are going out in our state.
Speaker 1: And the controller can certainly say, listen, here's what's happening.
Speaker 1: Here are some recommendations on how we can fix it.
Speaker 1: Here's a timeline that we should use to hold people accountable.
Speaker 1: But fundamentally it's then up to the legislature and the
Speaker 1: governor to make those changes. That the controller is not
Speaker 1: a policy maker in the same way that the governor
Speaker 1: or legislators are, but the controller can sure be, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of a pain in everyone's we're in basically saying
Speaker 1: why aren't you doing this, Why aren't you doing that?
Speaker 1: You know, why are we spending so much money on this?
Speaker 1: Why are we spending so much money on that? I
Speaker 1: see it as the ultimate source of information for the
Speaker 1: people of the state of California. Well, it strikes me
Speaker 1: that that position could be an unbelievable watchdog for the people.
Speaker 1: I mean, really being a hawk or well, I guess
Speaker 1: being a dog one moment, a hawk the next. I
Speaker 1: don't know. But you could be a real hero for
Speaker 1: the taxpayers, because we all know, particularly in corrupt Defornia,
Speaker 1: there's an enormous amount of money thrown around and nobody
Speaker 1: knows where it's going. Well, I mean, let's talk about
Speaker 1: the homelessness Christis as an example of that, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: we're spending tens of billions of dollars a year trying
Speaker 1: to address this problem at the state level, at local
Speaker 1: levels l A. San Francisco, I think the problem is
Speaker 1: getting worse. I don't think it's getting better. I think
Speaker 1: the pandemic accentuated a lot of challenges that we have.
Speaker 1: On that account, it'd be very nice to hear how
Speaker 1: much we're paying for the tents that are going up
Speaker 1: in some of these can be very nice to hear,
Speaker 1: you know, how much we're spending on mental health services
Speaker 1: of anything at all. So part of this is about
Speaker 1: helping people understand priorities and helping people understand where their
Speaker 1: money is going. Yeah, I got the perfect good example
Speaker 1: out of the news of the day in that yesterday,
Speaker 1: Gavin Newsome, governor of California announced, I think it was
Speaker 1: one point one billion dollars to clean up our roadways, graffiti, trash,
Speaker 1: all that sort of stuff. He said, the state is dirty.
Speaker 1: I'm glad he finally noticed, because the state is very dirty.
Speaker 1: But but but when I read that on the air,
Speaker 1: I said, um, I love the idea of cleaning up
Speaker 1: all this garbage, but I have no belief that that
Speaker 1: one point one billion dollars, at the end of it
Speaker 1: being spent, will actually have cleaned up the roads. And
Speaker 1: so it's like someone like you were the controller. You
Speaker 1: could make sure that that spent properly well right, and
Speaker 1: we could we could demonstrate with an audit exactly where
Speaker 1: that one point one billion dollars went. And then what
Speaker 1: we can do is we can do something called performance
Speaker 1: based budgeting. We can say, based on what you're spending,
Speaker 1: here is the outcome you've gotten. We can almost give
Speaker 1: it a letter grade. We can say, look, you spent
Speaker 1: one point one billion taking up the trash, and that
Speaker 1: got a D minus. Maybe in the future, Let's figure
Speaker 1: out either a smarter way to spend that one point
Speaker 1: one billion dollars, or maybe we don't spend that at all,
Speaker 1: we spend it on something else and we'll actually get
Speaker 1: the trash picked up. Right, So you're calling for accountability
Speaker 1: and government spending. What kind of radical are you? Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that this this is gonna be in trouble with that.
Speaker 1: This is a very extreme position I'm taking. I realize that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that gets us to the really the next question,
Speaker 1: I think the big obvious question. There are virtually no
Speaker 1: elected Republicans in the state of California anywhere. How do
Speaker 1: you think you're going to get people to vote for
Speaker 1: you as controller? Well, you know that the challenge is significant.
Speaker 1: So Republican hasn't been elected statewide in California since two
Speaker 1: thousand six. There hasn't been a Republican in the Controller's
Speaker 1: office since the nineteen seventies, so it's been it's been
Speaker 1: quite a long time. Um here's here's I think the
Speaker 1: way I approached this when I talked to Californians about
Speaker 1: the things I'd like to do as controller. Uh, some
Speaker 1: of the stuff we've talked about, accountability, transparency, figuring out
Speaker 1: how to be an independent voice on all sorts of
Speaker 1: different issues. I get a lot of agreement from Democrats,
Speaker 1: from Republicans, from independence, and if I'm gonna win this race,
Speaker 1: it's going to have to be with the support of
Speaker 1: people across the political spectrum. And you know, my approach
Speaker 1: is not particularly ideological. That may be disappointing to some.
Speaker 1: It's not particularly partisan. It is essentially technocratic. It's someone
Speaker 1: who wants to come in and solve problems. And I
Speaker 1: think that vision for this office at this time when
Speaker 1: Californians are very frustrated with what's going on. You know,
Speaker 1: whether you agree with the recall or not of Governor
Speaker 1: Gavin Newsom, surely everyone agrees that California can be doing better.
Speaker 1: And the point I'm trying to make is, you know,
Speaker 1: I grew up in California, I live in California now.
Speaker 1: I do love this state, but I think we can
Speaker 1: do better. And that's a message that people say, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what, I agree with that. You know, partisan Democrats,
Speaker 1: people who are independents. We're going to have to get
Speaker 1: support across the political spectrum. And that's why, you know,
Speaker 1: this may be disappointing to some, But I intend to
Speaker 1: approach these issues and talk about these issues and be
Speaker 1: laser focused on what I can do as controller to
Speaker 1: help make them better. Is controller and actual word? Or
Speaker 1: was that just a misprint? Nobody had the guts to
Speaker 1: correct them. So that sounds great. What you just said
Speaker 1: sounds fantastic. I mean, and you know, we unfortunately are
Speaker 1: a lot of preaching to the choir people that would
Speaker 1: already agree with you, you being the controller. I wish
Speaker 1: we could reach more ears of Democrats because I think
Speaker 1: a lot of Democrats if they heard that, Okay, he's
Speaker 1: not going to be he's not trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: be Trump or anything like that. He's just trying to
Speaker 1: make sure the money's not misspend. I think you can
Speaker 1: get a lot of people to vote for you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to hear what various other entities try
Speaker 1: to pin on you. But you know, and we're not
Speaker 1: gonna tell you how to do your job because you're
Speaker 1: way smarter than us and substantially better looking. But you know,
Speaker 1: I think we have decent we have decent instincts at
Speaker 1: least um and and one way I've tried to pitch
Speaker 1: you know, fiscal conservatism or fiscal responsibilitarianism, that's your word,
Speaker 1: because conservative comes loaded with a bunch of stuff, right,
Speaker 1: it's like thinking about abortion or whatever. No responsibility is
Speaker 1: a good word. But as I've said to my friends
Speaker 1: on the left, if your cause is mental health care,
Speaker 1: let's make sure every dime that's being wasted in government
Speaker 1: be found, rooted out and poured into mental healthcare. If
Speaker 1: you're concerned about the homeless, let's make sure the dollars
Speaker 1: we spend actually help the homeless. If you want to
Speaker 1: help pregnant illegal alien mother trans mothers, there's plenty of money.
Speaker 1: Let's root out to waste and redundancy, and we can
Speaker 1: find money to do what you think is it needs
Speaker 1: to be done. I think a message like that lone
Speaker 1: he might actually really catch democrats. Heres. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: you guys raise some really good points, which is that
Speaker 1: there's all sorts of political caricature and going on. And
Speaker 1: one of the things that I know opponents are going
Speaker 1: to come after me with they say, oh, he wants
Speaker 1: to cut spending on all these important priorities. You know,
Speaker 1: here's my point. Let's spend smarter. Let's spend smarter as
Speaker 1: you say, we've got some big problems, and I think
Speaker 1: people agree. We've got to spend our tax dollars wisely
Speaker 1: to address these problems. Mental health care is something maybe
Speaker 1: we should be investing more in, Maybe we should be
Speaker 1: doing more there, but gosh, let's figure out how we're
Speaker 1: spending it now and if it's effective. If it's effective,
Speaker 1: let's go and double down on things that are effective.
Speaker 1: Let's go and potentially and more on things that are affective.
Speaker 1: But that also means, at the same time, we have
Speaker 1: to be willing to make tough choices about things that
Speaker 1: aren't working, even things that sound good, that sound like
Speaker 1: they should produce good results. If we're not spending smarter,
Speaker 1: if we're not thinking about these problems and how to
Speaker 1: address them with a data driven approach, we are just
Speaker 1: literally lighting the money on fire. You might as well
Speaker 1: go outside, make a big pile of money and light
Speaker 1: it on fire, because that is essentially what we're doing
Speaker 1: now in so many programs. I'm seeing a TV ad
Speaker 1: with Lon hey Chin and a big pile of money
Speaker 1: being lit on fire. That's what we're doing every day, folks.
Speaker 1: How about a big bear But but I but I
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, I just, I really it pains
Speaker 1: me to see what we're doing now in our state.
Speaker 1: It is it's just dumb. We're better than this. We
Speaker 1: can do better than this. You know, we can't just
Speaker 1: keep throwing money out the window at problems that aren't
Speaker 1: getting better. If the problems we're getting better, then we say, yeah,
Speaker 1: go spend the money, go make the problem better. But
Speaker 1: that's not what's happening now. So this, to me is
Speaker 1: just it's just a very basic thing. Guys. It's like
Speaker 1: blocking and tackling in football, the basics. Right in baseball,
Speaker 1: you want to get down low and steal the baseball.
Speaker 1: This is we're just stuff we're not doing and it's
Speaker 1: so frustrating to me. And that's why I decided to
Speaker 1: get into this race, because it's like, at some point
Speaker 1: you just gotta go do it right. And I can
Speaker 1: talk about fixing these problems and I can write about them,
Speaker 1: but if you really want to make them better, you
Speaker 1: just gotta be willing to get an arena. Well, that's
Speaker 1: beautifully said. And if you do win the office of
Speaker 1: Controller of the State of California, can you get me
Speaker 1: on one of those phony boards because it seems like
Speaker 1: a great gig. You meet a few times a year, right,
Speaker 1: get a big chat, usually the golf course. Um, you
Speaker 1: would be amazed at how many of these boards and
Speaker 1: commissions there are, and and and and some of them.
Speaker 1: I read them. I read the title like four or
Speaker 1: five times. I'm still not sure what they do. I
Speaker 1: don't care. Just get me on one. So you know,
Speaker 1: one thing I think that you've got on your side
Speaker 1: here running as a Republican is I've been pretty surprised
Speaker 1: at how the completely blue run legislature has spanked Gavin
Speaker 1: Newsom a couple of times, at least verbally. I mean,
Speaker 1: the Sacramento b has been covered this quite a bit.
Speaker 1: One over the whole masks thing. They were really mad
Speaker 1: at the way he handled that, spending a billion dollars
Speaker 1: without a bid and the masks were not good and
Speaker 1: all that sort of. And then recently he seems pretty
Speaker 1: clearly lied about how many acres of fire control we're
Speaker 1: taking care of, and then the Democrat led the legislatures
Speaker 1: banked him on that again, calling him out for it.
Speaker 1: So they might be actually looking for somebody that's gonna,
Speaker 1: you know, speak the truth. Yeah, you know, I think
Speaker 1: there's This is frustration again. I think people they just
Speaker 1: don't want to be told problems are being solved when
Speaker 1: they're not actually being solved. And it's like who you're
Speaker 1: gonna believe, like this guy's words or your own lying eyes. Right,
Speaker 1: It's kind of like as you look at the homelessness problem,
Speaker 1: as you look at how we have had increasingly severe wildfires,
Speaker 1: how we are in drought but can't seem to have
Speaker 1: the storage to ensure that we've got proper water supply.
Speaker 1: People look at all these challenges and they say, listen,
Speaker 1: something is not right, something is not done as it's
Speaker 1: supposed to be done. And you know, people understand. They
Speaker 1: send a check to the Franchise Tax Board for their
Speaker 1: income taxes, they pay property taxes. I mean they people
Speaker 1: get it right. They sort of understand intuitively, I'm spending
Speaker 1: all this money, what the heck am I getting for?
Speaker 1: You know? And uh, you keep mentioning the homeless situation,
Speaker 1: and that's probably a good thing to do because that
Speaker 1: might be the number one because that's one Bill Maher,
Speaker 1: you know Bill Maher, lefty one of the leading liberals
Speaker 1: in the country, certainly in California. He keeps talking about
Speaker 1: the where's all this money going? Why does it cost
Speaker 1: a hundred thousand dollars for a tent for one person
Speaker 1: to being there? He might have you on his show
Speaker 1: to talk about this sort of thing. He'd be the
Speaker 1: kind of guy that would agree, this is ridiculous. All
Speaker 1: the money we spend on almost sism, we're gett no
Speaker 1: bang for a book. Yeah. I've actually done his show
Speaker 1: in the past. It's it's very entertaining, but it does
Speaker 1: tell you where people's heads are at, which is and
Speaker 1: and by the way, folks on the left approach from
Speaker 1: the perspective of you know, we're not helping people. We're
Speaker 1: you know, we need to be helping people more, and
Speaker 1: you know that's a policy debate we need to have,
Speaker 1: but we're not having it the facts right now. This
Speaker 1: is something that bothers me about our politics generally, guys,
Speaker 1: and we talked about this a lot. It's like we
Speaker 1: hear all these arguments and nothing really seems to be
Speaker 1: grounded in any kind of reality of what's actually going on.
Speaker 1: My point is, if you want to have a debate
Speaker 1: about the best way to solve homelessness, I am all
Speaker 1: for us having that debate, but let's have some facts
Speaker 1: from the table, you know, let's just say, look, here's
Speaker 1: what we're spending it on. Here are the forty three programs?
Speaker 1: Are the forty three things? And I'm making that number up.
Speaker 1: I'd have to go in and see what the exact
Speaker 1: number is. But some number of programs that we're that
Speaker 1: we're working on to address this problem. How's that actually
Speaker 1: working for you? How's that working for us? And then
Speaker 1: we can have it. Then we can have a discussion.
Speaker 1: And if the one party led legislature decide they want
Speaker 1: to keep doubling down on things that aren't working, then
Speaker 1: at least the public will know. The public will know
Speaker 1: exactly they chose to spend another four billion dollars of
Speaker 1: your tax dollars on a program that controller graded a
Speaker 1: D minus. How does that well? Well? I think if
Speaker 1: those words and thoughts reach the ears of voters, you
Speaker 1: will do very very well. But that's the great challenge,
Speaker 1: especially in so called down ticket race, is just getting
Speaker 1: any attention whatsoever. Uh, you know, we we wish you
Speaker 1: well in that endeavor. I'm I have despaired for the
Speaker 1: elector to California. Just don't think people are paying attention
Speaker 1: or digging into facts. All they know is, for instance,
Speaker 1: they hated Donald Trump, therefore they vote for days And
Speaker 1: it's as simple as that. But I hope I'm wrong.
Speaker 1: Well that's something I'm encouraging voters. You know. I think
Speaker 1: there's a tendency as as as this campaign has started,
Speaker 1: and I've done a number of interviews about it. You know,
Speaker 1: people want to put you into a box. The the
Speaker 1: the media and others. They want to put you into
Speaker 1: a box. Right. Are you a never Trumper? Are you
Speaker 1: uh maga type? Are you uh you know, conservative Republican?
Speaker 1: Are you progressive? Liberal? And you know what I say
Speaker 1: to people is I don't I don't want to be
Speaker 1: defined by someone else. I don't want to be defined
Speaker 1: by some you know, ideology. I'm going to be defined
Speaker 1: by my ideas, by the things I want to do.
Speaker 1: And if you find that answer insufficient, I'm sorry. But
Speaker 1: this campaign is about ideas, and it's about ideas for
Speaker 1: the future of California. And if you want to have
Speaker 1: a debate about my ideas, I will sit here and
Speaker 1: debate you all day long. We can have a day
Speaker 1: long conversation about it. I will answer every question you
Speaker 1: have about my ideas. But fundamentally, the problem we have
Speaker 1: in our politics is there's too many people chasing shiny objects.
Speaker 1: The media is partially responsible for this. The the explosion
Speaker 1: and social media and how we get our news as
Speaker 1: part of this as well. But but fundamentally my goal
Speaker 1: is let's have a conversation about what I can to
Speaker 1: a controller to make California better. If you disagree with
Speaker 1: some of those ideas, totally fine. I'm happy to have
Speaker 1: that conversation. But it is going to be hard to
Speaker 1: reach everybody, which is why it's important that I talked
Speaker 1: to folks like you, guys that have audiences and influence,
Speaker 1: and I do this all up and down the state,
Speaker 1: and that's why I intend to do I'm putting a
Speaker 1: bumper sticker on my car. Put an Asian in charge
Speaker 1: of math vote lanha Chen, come controller. I don't appreciate
Speaker 1: the stereotype, Lana. He I'm thinking California Board of Barbering
Speaker 1: and Cosmetology be a good place. There you go, I've
Speaker 1: gotten the haircuts my whole life, your whole life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's the thing your your that that expertise may
Speaker 1: actually be more relevant than the expertise of some of
Speaker 1: the people that end up on these boards. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's anyway we can we can talk about boarding
Speaker 1: commisions another time, but there's there's a there's over seventy
Speaker 1: of them. The controller sits on, believe it or not,
Speaker 1: the controller sits on the California Coastal Commission in even
Speaker 1: numbered years. And that's a weird make sense, but it's like,
Speaker 1: it's like what happens in the odd number of years.
Speaker 1: It's like, in the odd number of years, there's no
Speaker 1: decisions that need to be made when the controllers involved
Speaker 1: in the even number of years, they've got to be there.
Speaker 1: It's like, who came up with our friends John and
Speaker 1: Ken in Los Angeles. You're probably on their show too,
Speaker 1: but they they've been doing this for years, looking at
Speaker 1: the boards and how often they meet and what they
Speaker 1: get paid and everything. I mean, well, Lon he good luck,
Speaker 1: go get them. Huh Hey, thanks guys. I appreciate the
Speaker 1: time on the show and the opportunity to talk about
Speaker 1: the campaign and these issues. So thank you very much.
Speaker 1: Thank you got it. I'll tell you what, um, we
Speaker 1: have had a lot of people on running for a
Speaker 1: lot of different offices. I don't think I've ever wanted
Speaker 1: somebody to win and believed in the more than this one.
Speaker 1: I think he could save to a large extent, the
Speaker 1: state of California. And I honestly think that the challenge
Speaker 1: is going to be what you said, getting getting his
Speaker 1: thoughts and face and name in front of enough people,
Speaker 1: enough Democrats. But I honestly think if he could get
Speaker 1: the attention of every voter in California, have him listening
Speaker 1: lo he from, they'd say, Yeah, I don't care if
Speaker 1: there's an R next to his name. We need somebody
Speaker 1: who's just gonna look at this stuff and figuring out, Okay,
Speaker 1: if we if we approve eighteen quintrillion dollars to fight
Speaker 1: homelessness in Los Angeles, where's the damn money go? Because
Speaker 1: I'm paying for it? And two years later they're more
Speaker 1: homeless people, right right, yeah, exactly. Meanwhile, the forces that
Speaker 1: benefit enormously rake in cash from irresponsible, irresponsible spending aren't
Speaker 1: going to fight against him tooth and nail. They benefit
Speaker 1: from bad government and they know it. So I didn't
Speaker 1: want to do this with him on the line. What
Speaker 1: if you First of all, I don't think it's enough
Speaker 1: of a I don't remember ever voting for controller in
Speaker 1: my life. If I ever did, I probably just checked
Speaker 1: the R box and didn't even recognize the names. Um.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's like you said, it's not a
Speaker 1: hot ticket rates anyway. I don't know how much you
Speaker 1: know debates you'll see or bumper stickers or billboards or
Speaker 1: anything like that about people arguing in the barber shops,
Speaker 1: in the grocery stores of America. You're voting for her. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that they'll rise. But if you were
Speaker 1: an opponent, what would you, uh, how would you attack him?
Speaker 1: You're a d running. You're the next in line who
Speaker 1: had the the you know, I'm sure is the way
Speaker 1: it works. You're the next in line to get this job,
Speaker 1: to let the legislator spend money however they want and
Speaker 1: never pay attention to it. But what's your knock on Lone?
Speaker 1: It's a no brainer. He will cut spending for our
Speaker 1: for our state's children, our school children. He wants to
Speaker 1: cut spending for our nurses, for our fighter fighters. He'll
Speaker 1: cut spending from the miracle bullet train that will whisk
Speaker 1: us from here to You know, it's just he's a
Speaker 1: crazy man who's gonna cut off and children. You find
Speaker 1: a stock photo it's easy of him and Mitt Romney
Speaker 1: together smiling. He worked to get Mitt Romney elected. Remember
Speaker 1: Mitt Romney with a cash coming out of his pockets
Speaker 1: and so point, Oh, yeah, it'll be stupid because you can't.
Speaker 1: You can't attack him on the issues. It's got to
Speaker 1: be stupid, right, Yeah. You would think as much as
Speaker 1: we pay in taxes that you would pay attention to
Speaker 1: where it goes. And when you pay the property taxes
Speaker 1: that I'm paying, you're paying, everybody's paying, and the homeless
Speaker 1: situation keeps getting worse, that you would actually hold somebody accountable,
Speaker 1: you would think. But we don't. It's got to be
Speaker 1: the quality of life stuff. Because, as I've made clear
Speaker 1: a million times, the brilliant scheme of the left in
Speaker 1: California has been to narrow the tax base as much
Speaker 1: as possible, to really soak the high earners and and
Speaker 1: then leave everybody else more or less in the clear.
Speaker 1: Now we got granted their gas taxes and fees and
Speaker 1: the rest of it, and working class people do pay,
Speaker 1: but they don't pay nearly a proportional amount in California.
Speaker 1: So counting on people to be desperate for their tax
Speaker 1: dollars to be spent wisely. That will never work in California.
Speaker 1: And that was the idea from the beginning. I'm telling you,
Speaker 1: somebody was typing it and they hit the pee with
Speaker 1: their pinky, and they didn't have the guts to tell
Speaker 1: their boss that the word is not compatroller. And that's
Speaker 1: how it guts started. Sense I agree. Extra large