
Great sign.
Yesterday I happened to be watching the news at noon when they announced a gas tax protest rally would be held at 2pm at Sinclair’s gas station (the one with the big green plastic dinosaur next to Walmart).
Hosted by the Butte County Taxpayers League! Well excuse me, but who the hell is that?
https://buttetaxpayerscom.wordpress.com/about-2/
Seems this group has only been around for about six months, fronted by a local lawyer. They have a faceblob page as well. What’s funny is, they hadn’t posted anything about this rally, in fact, there’s been nothing posted on either site since June.
I like the sentiment, but I wonder – why so exclusive?
So, I signed up for e-mail updates, and left a note, inviting this shadowy group to come over and chat on the CTA blog, but I’m not holding my breath.
I did stop over at the rally, and I was happy to see a pretty good little mob, and more people arriving as we stood by.

Jim Nielsen is a good speaker, natural, and he made it clear – Californians are being ripped off, the gas tax hasn’t been used to fix the roads.
I had a hard time getting a picture of Nielsen, he’s small and the guy in front of me kept shifting back and forth. Nielsen is worth listening to, he knows the facts. You might not agree with him on everything, but he’ll engage. He was our first speaker, back when we still had meetings at the library, and he has always taken my concerns seriously, responding personally to e-mails.
What nobody addressed was what the state is actually doing with the gas tax money. Nobody has the nerve to talk about the pensions. Nielsen just went on and on about how we’re getting ripped off – I have to wonder, how much money goes into legislative salaries, including their well-heeled staffers.
How much money are they giving this lawyer to front their “taxpayers league”?
I was lucky to have just missed Gallagher’s little blab – that guy is all about himself. He’s going places alright, I’m just not sure I want to be holding onto his coattails.
When LaMalfa stepped up to the microphone I lost track of what he was jammering about and began to pay attention to the crowd. Some of them were obviously staffers and other government connected people, but there were others at the rally, including the hostile looking man who made the “Taxifornia” sign. He looked completely out of place – an old, disheveled man with tattoos on his hands, he looked like he had missed the turn into Walmart. But he held the sign, and let me take a picture of it, so he must be a believer.
I know the state steals from us. But I didn’t see anything in this rally but politicking. These guys are up for election again – the campaign starts the day after every election, remember? This rally, held long after the damage has already been done (the tax takes effect Wednesday), just didn’t seem very genuine.