No Runny Eggs

Revisions/extensions (5:36 pm 10/23/2007) – Upon reflection, and a bit of a “nudge” from Jib, I’ve taken out a cheap shot on those of you north of Hwy. 10. I apologize for that.

Let’s review the Cliff Notes version from today’s Journal Sentinel:

The compromise:

• Kills a proposed tax on hospitals, which dozens of Assembly Republicans opposed – even after the state’s hospitals endorsed it. After fighting it for months, hospitals began pushing for it this month, calling it the only way they would get the first Medicaid rate increase in more than 10 years. The tax would have been more than offset by additional federal dollars.

Good. I do have a note for Messrs. Walters and Marley and Ms. Forster – those “additional federal dollars” are also tax dollars; they just come from a different unit of government.

• Kills a new $233 million tax on oil companies, which Doyle had proposed to force them to help pay for the state’s highways and bridges.

Again, good. Not only does it save Wisconsin taxpayers $233 million $466 million (or however much was collected times two when it would have received the stake through the heart) in new taxes (while “Big Oil” would have been collecting said cash because they would have found a way to pass it along, they likely would also have won a full refund because they would have been “prohibited” from passing it along), but it saves us untold milllions that would have been turned around into Craps’ and the Rats’ pockets.

• Raises a tax credit to offset higher property taxes for schools resulting from the certification of last year’s state aid levels to local school districts. Schools are likely to raise property taxes higher than usual this year because the state budget is so late.

And thus it ensures higher taxes for schools, rather than merely making it likely. I was very uncomfortable with the Pubbies’ line of $600 million in tax hikes if their earlier capitulation on school funding wasn’t passed by the Senate.

• Raises the current 77-cent tax on a pack of cigarettes by $1 to pay for health care costs. Doyle had recommended an increase of $1.25.

No wonder why the Assembly ‘Rats were included in negotiations; RINO P-I-G member Huebsch is going to need their votes to carry the day. Of note, the Senate Pubbies were absent from the table because the Senate ‘Rats have no problem whatsover with raising taxes.

• Increases the one-time $175 million transfer from the fund that helps pay legal awards in medical malpractice cases by at least $25 million. The transfer will be fought in a lawsuit to be filed by the Wisconsin Medical Society – a suit that may take years to resolve.

With a likely loss for the state, and $200 million-plus-interest tax increase upon said loss. Nothing like enriching lawyers, who will, as noted above, turn right around and enrich the ‘Rats.

• Includes one of Doyle’s top priorities, the Wisconsin Covenant, which guarantees eighth-grade students the ability to enroll in a Wisconsin college if they take college-prep courses in high school, maintain a B average and stay out of trouble. No one knows what the Covenant will cost when students who have already signed up for the program enroll in the state’s colleges and universities.

Let’s repeat that last line – No one knows what the Covenant will cost when students who have already signed up for the program enroll in the state’s colleges and universities. Allow me to put a preliminary, back-of-the-envelope price tag on that. Since I expect no less than the current total incoming freshman class between the UW system and the technical colleges to take advantage of this deal (worth roughly $43,000 to those who signed that formerly-worthless piece of paper the last month or so and who plan on a 4-year education, at an annual increase of 6% from the $7,600 annual cost of tuition), there will not be any room for those willing to pay, whether in-state or out-of-state. I haven’t been able to collate the various technical colleges’ tuition intake, nor have I been able to separate out the undergrad-vice-graduate portions of the UW tuition intake, but let’s use the UW total tuition intake as an approximation. For the 2006-07 school year, that was estimated to be roughly $865,000,000. Once the “Covenant” fully kicks in for the 2015-16 school year, we’ll be on the hook for an additional $1,379,000,000 that year. That will, like any Hugh Gubmint program, likely be way on the low side.

• Expands health care coverage to almost all Wisconsin children through the new BadgerCare Plus program.

Out goes CubaCare, in comes CubaCare Jr. We’re about to find out why the expansion of the federal S-CHIP was sunk the hard way.

• Includes $21 million in additional school aid for low-income districts – $17 million of which would go Milwaukee Public Schools. MPS would have to use the money to partially offset property taxes it levies for the school choice program. It would also give MPS $10 million for math and science classes.

And the money-laundering known as “revenue sharing” continues not only unabated, but ever larger.

• Puts a 2% limit on increases in 2008 and ’09 property tax levies for cities, towns and villages, or limits increases to the rate of actual growth, whichever is higher.

Un-fragging-believable; a win on property taxes. However, I won’t believe it until the ink is dry on the governor’s signature on the bill, and there aren’t any lines through that provision, and that’s assuming it’s not as full of holes as the previous Craps anti-freeze. The bad news; hold onto your wallets; there isn’t even the Craps anti-freeze for the 2007 property tax bills, and that’s the baseline for the 2008 and 2009 ones.

• Reduces spending from Doyle’s original proposal by more than $400 million.

Dirty little secret; it still pushes spending up by $4.6 billion over the last budget. As Dad29 pointed out, that’s a 2-year increase in taxes, both state and federal, of 8%, or 3.92% per year. How many of you in the private, non-union sector have been getting 3.92% raises? Bueller? Bueller?

With roughly half the budget coming from the trough known as federal taxpayers, that’s a $2.3 billion state tax increase, with $1 billion in brand-new state taxes. Allow me to repeat that last prase – $1 billion in brand-new state taxes. Judy Robson got exactly what she demanded.

• Funds free tuition for veterans, provides $32 million in new financial aid to University of Wisconsin System students and backs the system’s plan to expand enrollment. Killed, however, would be a plan to provide in-state tuition for illegal immigrants who graduate from Wisconsin high schools, as Doyle had wanted.

It’s a mish-mash of items. First, I could’ve swore the GI Bill dealt with with tuition for veterans, but if I’m off, I’m willing to give them free tuition. Second; guess that “Covenant” starts a bit early. Third, if I thought expanded enrollment wouldn’t involve more and more tax dollars going to the UW system, I could see the need. Finally, the question of the day is, will the “Covenant” also be illegal-alien-free?

• Increases the annual vehicle registration fee by $20, to $75, and raises registration fees for large commercial trucks.

Gotta keep on building those 4-lane bypasses of every Podunk last north-Wisconsin town </sarcasm>

• Drops a Democratic plan to extend the Metra commuter rail line from Kenosha to Milwaukee. But a last-minute effort to revive the rail-line plan will be made Monday, when a committee of legislative leaders votes on the deal, Kreuser said.

Allow me to introduce Smith & Wesson to silver bullets, and then introduce said bullets to the KRM disaster-in-waiting.

• Increases bonds to preserve recreational lands to $85 million a year, up from $60 million. The budget also will give the Legislature oversight of any land purchases – authority it lost in 2003.

I would like to see how that “oversight” is written before I comment on the last part. The first part, frankly, sucks, as it is an automatic property-tax increase.

I do note that nobody has yet seen the actual bill, so I can’t comment on how loosely certain provisions that currently appear to be Pubbie “wins” are written. I also note that there is no promise from Doyle to not wield his Frankenstein veto pen to take out items such as the “freeze”. Wendy already applied it to his pledge from his first state of the state address.

One thing the Journtinel doesn’t report; the pork Doyle threw in to try to get his previous plan past the Assembly is still there, including Brett Davis’ soybean crusher.

In sum, the Pubbies got rolled (again). For 30 pieces of silver and a few meaningless words, they’re signing onto a $2,300,000,000 tax increase now and untold billions down the road through unconsciable increases in the size of state gubmint. Everybody who votes for this budget, RINO, RepubicRAT or DemocRAT, needs to be ousted. If said Leggie signed a no-tax-increase pledge, whether it be Club For Growth’s very restrictive one, Owen’s less-restrictive one, or somebody else’s, the recall window is now open.