February 4, 2003
Dear California Citizens & Friends Across the Nation:
It’s time for us to take action and recall Democrat Governor Gray Davis. I need you to go to
www.RecallGrayDavis.com right now and join this important cause before it is too late.
I’m former State Assemblyman Howard Kaloogian, and I am proud to have served as one of the leading conservative Republicans in the California State Assembly during the past decade. However, I am not proud to see the disastrous track record and ethical and criminal investigations that have surrounded Gray Davis’ administration.
Each and every day Californians have learned of new hardships caused by the huge state deficit created by Governor Davis’ out-of-control spending. Now we face massive cuts to education and public safety and increases in every tax imaginable. On top of that, because Gray Davis has made the state so unfriendly to business, companies are increasingly moving jobs out of California.
Before long California will be a state full of people who expect a check from the government – paid for by the few of us who will still be employed!
That’s why we must take action now and recall Gray Davis.
It’s important that you realize that we need the help of more than just Californians. Gray Davis has raised millions of dollars from his liberal friends and special interest groups all throughout the United States. To be blunt – it’s time that good men and women in these states who oppose his vision for California and our nation stand up and negate the advantage Davis receives from these out of state special interest contributions.
There is a second reason it is so important for people all throughout the country to support this recall drive. Right now Gray Davis is proposing the taxation of the Internet, in addition to a string of other tax increases to bail himself out of California’s budget crisis.
If he is successful and is not turned out of office this will open the floodgates for other states to follow in California's lead in pushing for the taxing of goods on the Internet. Do you really want the government to be allowed to tax one more part of your life?
So whether it be as little as $35 or as much as $1,000 or more, I need you to set aside just a couple minutes and make an urgently needed contribution to the Recall Gray Davis fund. You can make a contribution at your computer right now by clicking HERE.
Californians reluctantly elected Governor Davis on the premise that he had a handle on the problems facing our state. Since then we have found that his words were nothing but lies and distortions – just campaign rhetoric to get him through the election
Gray Davis lied to us about the size and scope of the budget crisis. Davis is now admitting we have a $34.6 billion budget deficit – the largest budget deficit of any state in American history!
Every time our state hits a new low because of Gray Davis’ failed leadership and corruption, people say “it can’t get any worse,” yet each time it does. Every day brings added bad news – more companies leaving the State. Just this week, Hewlett Packard, Buck Knives, Earthlink and others announced they were shutting down businesses here in the state.
Davis had to lie about the seriousness of the budget crisis. Because as we all clearly saw from his first term in office, the only thing Gray Davis has been focused on is an insatiable appetite for campaign fundraising.
Consider the words of San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders:
“He’s the Megalomania Governor. From the moment he won office in 1998, Davis worked on two things: re-election and fundraising for re-election.” (San Francisco Chronicle, March 14, 2002)
Now we are paying the price. Rather than reducing the pace at which he was enlarging the size and scope of government, Davis kept his foot on the spending pedal. He knew that by handing out money and starting more Big Government social programs that he would be buying loyalties for his re-election.
Seeking election to political office is the only thing that Gray Davis cares about, and now our state is suffering the consequences.
So if you haven’t already done so – PLEASE! – join your fellow Californians who are ready to take action – join the campaign to recall Gray Davis.
Here are three quick and easy steps to help ensure this recall drive is successful:
Go to the website contribution page and make a contribution of ANY amount – if you can contribute just $35 or more then you will be helping to ensure we can fund the campaign to get the message out on Gray Davis’ record of failure and the need to recall him.
Forward this email to at least 5 friends or family members. It doesn’t matter whether they live in California or not – we need the help of supporters from around America to join together if we are to be successful.
Post this message or the link to
www.RecallGrayDavis.com at internet message and discussion boards to help raise the profile of this effort and get more volunteers involved.
And if you are not yet convinced of the need to remove Gray Davis from office immediately then read on.
One of the worst violations of the public trust that Gray Davis has engaged in has been his reversal on his pledge not to raise taxes.
While campaigning for re-election, Davis promised voters he would not raise their taxes to bail himself out of the budget mess he created.
Consider the words Gray Davis used just last year in a conversation he had with Los Angeles Times columnist George Skelton:
“I will not advocate raising taxes…Let me say this clearly as I can, I don’t think it makes good economic sense to penalize individuals during a recession by raising their taxes…I don’t want new taxes.”
Now that Davis has secured re-election, Davis is pushing for tax increases left and right.
That’s what happens when you increase spending by nearly 40% during your first term in office while the underlying growth in population and inflation has been less than 15%. It doesn’t take long before you are nearly bankrupt – and that is where Davis has California now.
Gray Davis thinks your taxes are too low and that the best way to pay for his out of control spending is for YOU to pay for it all with higher taxes.
Davis and the liberal Democrats who control every branch of government in Sacramento have proposed everything from tripling your vehicle registration tax (the car tax) to taxes on groceries, and now taxing the Internet!
That’s right – Davis is looking to tax the Internet as a way to generate more revenue to cover his out-of-control spending.
Gray Davis’ proposals are insane and irresponsible. If California unilaterally taxes internet businesses that have a retail location IN California, he will be driving up the costs and prices of businesses in California that have a retail location and employees. This will mean that it will be cheaper to buy products from retailers with NO California presence than ones with stores and employees here in our state.
And that will mean higher taxes for you and yet more jobs lost in our state.
So you have a choice. You and your children can spend the next several decades paying exorbitantly higher taxes, or you can take action and join our effort to restore competent new leadership to California. To save yourself from higher taxes, make a contribution to the Recall Gray Davis effort for whatever you can afford to give by clicking HERE.
And, remember, these tax increases are ON TOP of the higher electricity prices we all pay because he messed up the energy crisis and let the energy companies take us to the cleaners. We now have the highest energy rates in the country to go with the highest income tax rate. Yet, Davis wants taxes to go even higher.
You can bet that Nevada, with no income tax at all, is going to get another burst of population from California. New statistics out show that productive, tax-paying citizens are moving out of the State into other western states. Who is going to be left to pay the huge bills Gray Davis is running up?
You can be sure Gray Davis will once again have no qualms about burdening working class families and small businesses with higher taxes to pay the tab for others.
Since Gray Davis took office we have seen over 250,000 manufacturing jobs leave California. And there have been hundreds of thousands of jobs lost in other sectors of California’s economy as well.
What is most amazing is that while families suffer the hardships of lost jobs and income due to Gray Davis, the Governor seems oblivious – continuously increasing the size of government.
In November 2001, there were 63,100 manufacturing jobs lost in our state. That same month Davis added 58,200 new government positions to the roles that taxpayers must pay for.
And to pay for these government jobs, Davis is now cutting education and public safety.
The most recent spending proposal from Davis calls for cuts to the world-renowned University of California college system. He is increasing fees to the state colleges and community colleges – which sometimes are the only opportunity many people have to get a start on a college degree.
We finally have achieved lower class sizes in our schools and improved working conditions for our teachers. But, now, all of these gains are at terrible risk. Davis is taking money out of education and innovation and instead pouring it into growing government.
He must be stopped before he does any more damage! Our children are going to inherit a California that is not worthy of being passed on to them. Is that what we want, to leave them a wrecked California that was allowed to decay and rot under the corruption and negligence of Gray Davis?
Not only is education on the top of the cut list from the Governor, but he is also jeopardizing public safety. By cutting money the state normally sends to counties and cities, they don’t have enough money to keep police, sheriffs and fire departments adequately staffed.
That means public safety – one of the most vital and legitimate functions of government – is going to bear the brunt of the Davis cuts. He doesn’t want to go after any of the special interest groups who appear to have weaned favors from him in return for campaign contributions.
Unless we take action NOW, that is exactly what will happen.
My friends – the recall process is something that should be reserved for only the most serious cases of malfeasance in office.
Unfortunately Gray Davis’ conduct far surpasses the standards necessary to justify a recall. It’s not a question of whether we should recall Gray Davis, it’s an issue of how long we will continue to wait – all the while watching California slide further into the abyss.
So please don’t wait a minute more – go to
www.RecallGrayDavis.com and make a contribution and sign up to help out in your area.
I look forward to working with you in the coming days on our efforts to restore great leadership for California.
Sincerely,
Howard Kaloogian
Former California State Assemblyman
P.S. I really do hope you’ll join us and make a contribution to our recall effort. Make a contribution by logging on to our contributors page HERE. Perhaps this excerpt from Peter Schrag’s column in the Sacramento Bee will convince you of the need to take action NOW!
“To most people who've followed Gov. Gray Davis' 30-year career in politics, the idea that his second and last term in Sacramento might produce a different kind of governor is preposterous. The pay-to-play politician, the obsessive fund-raiser, the implement-my-vision control freak -- you'd be nuts to expect that.” (January 22, 2003 – Sacramento Bee)
Wouldn’t it be great to have a new Governor, someone more like Ronald Reagan, instead of four more years of Gray Davis?
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