All Our Taxes Won't Save Texas; Leave That to the Least of Our Brothers and Sisters

Houston Chronicle political reporter Lisa Falkenberg has an excellent commentary in today's newspaper on the suicidal folly of the state budget Texas Republicans plan to enact.

Being last among the fifty states in per capita spending and health insurance coverage? That just wasn't good enough for Texas. And so, says Falkenberg, Governor Rick Perry shows us what he really means when he urges Republicans "seize the moment" and "show the rest of the country how conservative governing and budgeting can help lead the way out of this national economic crisis."

They will accomplish this feat by unemploying up to 100,000 educators, denying financial aid to 60,000 students, and cutting programs like Medicaid, the Children's Health Insurance Program and food stamps by $2 billion. Really something to be proud of! Go Rick!

Falkenberg's commentary follows in full:

Hey you! Teacher who's going to lose your job, stop worrying. There's no state budget shortfall.

Hey you, community college student who's going to lose your financial aid, and maybe even your campus, stop whining. There's no budget shortfall.

Hey you, kid from the poor side of town who could lose your health insurance and probably your access to pre-school, stop crying. There's no budget shortfall.

There can't be. This is Texas. And according to Gov. Rick Perry, we don't have shortfalls in Texas. And certainly not deficits.

We may have "budget challenges," as Perry termed them in his inauguration speech. They may be challenges that require more than $30 billion in cuts. Those cuts may lead to, among many other things, the elimination of nearly 10,000 state jobs and as many as 100,000 public education jobs, loss of financial aid for 60,000 students; and $2 billion in cuts to programs like Medicaid, CHIP and food stamps that keep our most vulnerable citizens alive.

But, hey, no biggie.

Lost jobs and health insurance aren't exactly urgent matters. And investing in our state's future through the education of our young people is no emergency.

No, in the great state of Texas we reserve that term "emergency" for much weightier matters.

Like cracking down on voter fraud that doesn't exist, outlawing sanctuary cities that never were, and supporting a federal balanced budget amendment that has no hope of passing.

And, of course, allowing the government to barge into a medical exam room and order a woman considering an abortion to submit to a procedure that will compound her emotional distress. You know, important stuff like that.

The governor recently bestowed upon the above issues emergency status while he was in Las Vegas peddling his book at a hunting and shooting trade show. I think this is what the governor would call "multitasking."

Like nearly every other state, Texas is required to balance its budget each session. This means we'll never rack up trillions in credit card debt like the federal government.

In lean times — doomsday times, if you read those paranoid liberal loons in the mainstream media - when there's not enough money coming in to pay the bills, when we're estimated to have only slightly more revenue than we spent in 2006-2007, despite inflation and population growth and increased demand on social services, we don't raise taxes. (Maybe a few fees that nobody will notice, but not taxes.)

We simply cut the fat. Even if there isn't any. Even if we find ourselves hacking away at bone matter.

Now, to the faint of heart, this may sound draconian, especially considering that Texas already ranks dead last in per capita state spending and first in the number of people without health insurance.

But there simply aren't any other options - except, well, it is true that Perry boasted proudly in his campaign ads last year that "today, we have billions in surplus." Indeed we do. It's called the Rainy Day Fund. But the governor has vowed to defend from frantic pillaging that $9 billion pile of your money and mine for the logical reason that if it were spent, the governor and his Republican colleagues could no longer proudly boast that today we have billions in surplus.

It really all comes down to a simple exercise in prioritization. Some things count: the governor's Enterprise "deal closing" Fund for businesses. And some things don't: Early childhood education.

It's the Texan way, the Texas Exception. And lest you take exception, take a moment to recall the prophetic words in Perry's recent inauguration speech. He called on Texans to show the rest of the country how conservative governing and budgeting can help lead the way out of this national economic crisis.

This, declared the governor, will some day come to be known by historians as the "Texas Century."

"This is our time, this is our place in history," according to the governor's speech. "We must seize the moment."

And so we must!

After all, the way we're headed, it could be our last.