State Politics

A subscriber forwards this article by Tim de Chant, a science writer.

In the piece, he examines an academic study that measures how much wealth was concentrated in how few hands during the height of the Roman Empire in 150 C.E.*

At a December 13 press conference, Gov. Jerry Brown, holder of a 1961 degree in classics from the University of California at Berkeley, said the current gulf between America’s haves and have-nots is akin to Ancient Rome where “it was the same fight between the aristocrats and the plebians.” 

Not exactly  – as De Chant and the study by Walter Schiedel and [....]

A subscriber forwards this article by Tim de Chant, a science writer.

In the piece, he examines an academic study that measures how much wealth was concentrated in how few hands during the height of the Roman Empire in 150 C.E.*

At a December 13 press conference, Gov. Jerry Brown, holder of a 1961 degree in classics from the University of California at Berkeley, said the current gulf between America’s haves and have-nots is akin to Ancient Rome where “it was the same fight between the aristocrats and the plebians.” 

Not exactly  – as De Chant and the study by Walter Schiedel and [....]

Gov. Jerry Brown’s 1961 undergraduate degree from the University of California at Berkeley is in Classics.

Lest there was some doubt, at a December 13 Capitol press conference explaining that California must exercise fiscal disicpline and spend within its means, Brown said:

“Nemo dat quod non habet.”

Translated: “No man gives what he doesn’t have.”

Brown left out the “quod” when he used the line but aides assured that secretly he meant to say it.

As icing on the cake, Brown assessed the nation’s electorate as “frustrated and discontent.” Troubled, too, by the inequities highlighted by the Occupy protesters. 

“In Ancient Rome [....]

Edmund G. Brown Jr., the Tight-With-a-Taxpayer-Dime Democratic governor hath issued an executive order, his signature affixed thereto, this day (December 12) in the Year of Our Lord 2011 ordering “agency secretaries and department directors (to) prepare a list of all reports that they are required to submit to the Legislature and identify those that may no longer be of significant value to the Legislature.”

According to the Great Cost Cutter, “substantial efforts and costs are expended in preparing, tracking and filing these reports.”

There are approximately 2,600 such reports required annually, sayeth the GCC, according to an audit by his Department of Finance.

[....]

“I am concerned about the uncertain and increasing tax burden created by many publicly sponsored pension systems. This particular bill goes too far when it authorizes local jurisdictions to pay 50 percent of the employees’ pension contributions and at the same time permits employees who leave the job before retirement to receive a windfall in the form of a refund of all such employer contibutions.”

   –Gov. Jerry Brown, SB 1398 veto message, June 22, 1976

Unveiling his “Twelve Point Pension Reform Plan,” Gov. Jerry Brown was asked at an Oct. 27 press conference if less generous retirement benefits necessitate larger salaries for employees. The Democratic governor acknowledged that such was the case but notrd that the salary of an employee can always be reduced in a subsequent year or that employee can be sacked.

Not so with benefits confered through a person’s pension:

“Once you’re in that rocketship, you’re in orbit and you’re not coming back,” the man once known as “Governor Moonbeam” said. (Ground Control to Major Tom.)

(Editor’s Note: Brown’s 12 point plan comes [....]