As someone who lived in California for a while, I can personally attest that the state’s absurdity truly knows no bounds.

But even I am stunned by this latest proposal.

According to a report from the San Francisco Chronicle’s SFGate, California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal is calling for a tax on drinking water.

Yes. Drinking water. That clear liquid that all life needs to survive and sustain itself. California wants to tax it.

SFGate, citing the newly released 2019-20 budget summary, notes that Newsom’s proposal is similar to what former Gov. Jerry Brown had previously abandoned after failing to garner enough support.

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Under Brown’s failed proposal, Californians would have been taxed about 95 cents a month, or $11.40 a year.

To be completely fair, like most leftist nonsense gone awry, Newsom’s tax proposal has a kernel of a good intention.

The proposed tax would help bring clean and safe drinking water to underprivileged California communities that don’t have the easiest access to it.

In and of itself, there’s certainly nothing wrong with wanting to help the disadvantaged. That’s a good thing.

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But leave it to California Democrats to twist that noble idea and make it a mechanism for bigger and more intrusive government.

The issues with Newsom’s proposal are numerous and onerous.

First and foremost, wantonly asking Americans to hand over their well-earned money to the government is a dangerously slippery slope.

Yes, in some instances taxation is absolutely necessary. But it speaks volumes about the Democratic Party that taxing Americans seems to be their go-to response to any issue.

Secondly, as the Sacramento Bee notes, Jon Coupal of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association doesn’t think a tax should even be necessary when the state “is sitting on a $14.8 billion budget surplus.”

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Coupal is 100 percent correct on that, just as he is when he observes that the tax proposal is emblematic “of California’s knee-jerk reaction to default to a new tax whenever there’s a new problem.”

Association of California Water Agencies deputy executive director Cindy Tuck echoed similar concerns to the Bee.

“We think the problem can be solved without a tax,” Tuck said.

That’s really the crux of California’s absurdity.

Nobody’s disputing that an issue like access to clean water isn’t worth addressing.

It’s the manner in which California and leftists at large insist on addressing those issues that is the problem.

If there is a tiny glimmer of hope for Californians, it’s that there’s no guarantee the proposal will pass and there are no specifics yet.

As it stands, it’s just the beginning of yet another misguided idea. Hopefully for Californians, that’s where it stays.

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