Back to Question 1

Based on numbers before last week's cuts...

The District Attorneys are budgeted $102 million in this year's state budget. A 40 percent cut via passage of Question 1 would mean a reduction of roughly $40 million (my math is awesome). What would that mean? Probably not much, because the $600 million trial court budget would be slashed by $240 million. Fewer judges, fewer courtrooms, mean less need for DAs, so this all works out perfectly. At the same time, the State Police would be cut about $114 million out of its $285 million. Which is fine, because the courts wouldn't be able to handle the backlog, so the police don't have to worry about it.

But wait, all those bad guys wouldn't need to go through the court system anyway, because the sheriffs would cut about $114 million out of its $286 million, so there would be fewer jails and guards to watch the bad guys. Which is fine, because there would be fewer DAs and judges and so forth. Better news: DOC would cut about $200 million out of its $540 million, so the state prisons would also be cut back. But that's OK, because the court system will be processing fewer bad guys, so there won't be that big of a need.

In the meantime, UMass would be cut about $200 million out of its $497 million. But that's OK, because UMass could get around it with fees. If a kid can't afford it, they can go to a state college. And they'll get cut about $88 million out of $222 million. But that's OK, too. Not everyone can afford Harvard. Not everyone can afford FSC. They can go to a community college. Which will lose about $96 million of its $222 million. But that's OK, because not everyone can afford to go to college. Those kids should just get a job. And business will be streaming in and hiring all these kids because there's no income tax. Businesses can train 'em, no problem.

Forget what I wrote before Question 1 makes so much sense.