Gov. Brown: It's the Taxes or the Cuts

He's right, you know.

California Governor Jerry Brown pledged to cut $25 billion from an $85 billion spending plan to close the state’s budget gap if lawmakers block a special election to allow voters to extend temporary tax increases.

If lawmakers don’t approve the special election, Brown said he’d hold up the budget for as long as it takes to eliminate the $25 billion deficit through spending cuts.

“It’s very fundamental, whether you vote the taxes or you vote the cuts,” said Brown, a 72-year-old Democrat who was governor from 1975 to 1983. He spoke today at a joint legislative budget conference committee hearing in Sacramento.

Brown has pledged to fix the financial strains that have left California with the biggest deficit of all U.S. states, and the lowest credit rating. With an economy bigger than Russia’s, California has coped with $100 billion of budget gaps in the past three years amid the global recession.

I'm no fan of Moonbeam, but to his credit he's trying to fix the mess. The choice really does come down to extending some taxes or making massive cuts.  At least he's not talking about huge tax increases.  That's a plus.