California's New Database

While $40 billion in debt and unable to meet the existing obligations of the government, the CA Senate Majority Leader proposes a new government program to create a database for identifying convicted animal abusers.  I love animals and the abuse of them makes me physically ill.  I believe that those who torture animals should be locked up in institutions and be subjected to the same toruture they inflicted.  I believe that punishment for abuse and neglect should be harsher, but I also don't believe that CA is in any condition to spend more money at this point.

Were the state in a sound financial situation and they were persuing this database, I wouldn't think anything of it.  I don't believe it can be fully effectual since many people give pets away for free and anybody on the register would just check the newspaper and get their pets from somebody without access to the register list, but if it would help at all and the state had the money to pay for it, then good for them for looking after our furry little friends.  However, CA is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and currently can't meet the obligations to the people of their state much less the animals.

This database is simply one more illustration of how out of touch politicians are with economics and budgets.  How, when the state is in the financial situation it is, can anybody propose a new program to be paid for by the state?  It's absurdity at it's most glaring.

There should be nothing coming out of the California Legislature except ways to SAVE money and reduce the deficit, and yet they persist in suggesting new ways to spend money they do not have.  It's an epidemic in houses of politics across the nation and as yet no cure has been identified.