That's a slogan, not a solution. Purely at the local level, I like things like street lights, roads without holes in them, public parks, libraries, functioning emergency services and so on. So do a lot of people who live in cities, and they get upset when those services are cut. Now those things involve a cost, so the problem we have is how to minimize that cost and distribute it equably and efficiently. 'Starve the beast!' is no more of a viable plan than 'Eat the rich!'

Fun fact: Chicago has a budget of about $9 billion for 2.7 million people, plus Cook County has a budget of $4 billion for 5 million people. San Francisco City and County has a budget of $7 billion for under a million people. Fairfax County, where my parents live, has a 3.7 billion budget for about a million people.

Chicago and Illinois are not high-tax high-spend jurisdictions. The top income tax rate in republican Virginia is almost double the historical income tax rate in Illinois. Their fiscal problems are the result of being low tax jurisdictions with moderate expenditures.

While in theory I support smaller government in practice I'm pretty sure I should be grateful for large government since without it I would not have my private sector software development job. I’m a totally blind software developer and one of the major reasons the screen reading software I use in my job is kept up to date is section 508.