Jerry Brown: California saved its economy by doing the exact opposite of what the GOP wants

Recognizing the threat of climate change, cutting fat from the budget and raising taxes -- that's the threefold plan California's Gov. Jerry Brown (D) says brought his state's economy back from the brink.

In an interview with "60 Minutes," Brown talked about how legislating for climate change and increasing taxes on the wealthy helped take California from the ninth largest economy in the world to the sixth and turned more than $50 billion of debt into a budget surplus of over $7 billion.

"The fact is that we cut the budget," said Brown. "We raised taxes and the economy roared back."

"60 Minutes" anchor Bill Whitaker said, "You cut the budget, you raised taxes, these days that sounds like a prescription for political suicide."

"You gotta pay some taxes," Brown said. "You have to invest. We need to invest in the technology of tomorrow or somebody else will."

As Ronald Reagan, Jr. noted earlier this year, California's success gives the lie to the Republican orthodoxy of "trickle down economics." By rescinding Republican tax cuts for the wealthy, the state was able to fill its coffers and grow.

This stands in direct contrast the the Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (R), a Tea Party stalwart who has destroyed his state's economy by cutting taxes to the bone and thereby bankrupting its coffers. The promised economic boons of tax cuts to millionaires never came.

Republicans' relies on the same GOP hokum to justify sweeping tax cuts for the wealthy, a plan that critics have pointed out will explode the national deficit and do little to improve the economy.

Watch the video, embedded below: