Stockton, CA Bankruptcy ruling.

City of Stockton, CA to be adjudged a bankrupt municipality and will receive the bankruptcy court's contract-amending "cramdown" powers to re-negotiate contracts for basic services such as the grossly-overpaid police and firemen. Primary question was how much "bullet" a city has to bite in discretionary cuts before it "throws in the towel" and uses the bankruptcy court to attack the really troublesome debt items.

At no time was the court urged to hold the city responsible for giving in to the "if it bleeds it leads" media frenzy that caused the general populace to approve of over-hiring in police and fire departments and the granting of such high salaries and overly generous pension benefits. City taxpayers will not have to pay for unwise past spending or unwisely relied on income projections. This means the city will have the power to amend present contracts but will not be required to bear the financial burden of having created an over-supply of overly paid public service employees such as police/fire/teachers who then formed the core of an unholy alliance between voters and city officials. The officials hire and grossly over pay the city workers who then act as a voting block to retain the officials in office. No one stands up and states that crime rates are not that bad, that police are not needed, that social problems should not be criminalized and that schools should not be local day care centers that liberate housewives at tremendous costs to the taxpayers.

After decades of such over spending based on tabloid reasoning, suddenly the city is permitted to start paring the overly generous contracts in the upper class strata that it created.