Gorillas in the Fog

By Gene Case, Hindsight Community Fellow, July 19, 2011 at 3:00 pm

In the current national budget negotiating stasis there are three 8,000lb gorillas that have, as yet, attracted little or no discussion: 1) two wars on the credit card, 2) massive unfunded tax breaks--heavily tilted toward “job creators” who seem capable only of creating jobs abroad and 3) an overall health care system in which costs are dragging the entire economy into the dumper.

But, for purposes of dealing with the current state impasse, a variation of gorilla #2 is, by far, the dominant simian. It is the residue of the political ambitions and penchant for pandering over leading of our former governor, and his use of accounting tricks, tobacco settlement money and federal stimulus funds to kick budgetary problems down the road. Incredibly, he now regularly congratulates himself on this accomplishment, which Governor Dayton aptly describes as a “horrible fiscal mess.”

According to Star Tribune columnist, Lori Sturdevant, leading up to the state government shutdown, Governor Dayton and conservative lawmakers had closed to within roughly $1 billion of each other’s proposals, but could not bridge the gap. An obvious solution, but one certainly not acceptable to conservatives, would have been to go back to 1998 state income tax rates. That alone, would provide roughly $800 million in additional revenue, which should have been—even in today’s political climate—enough to avoid the dire consequences of the shutdown.

And that, in a nutshell, defines the sorry reality where the state and the nation now reside. The conservative movement of old has morphed into the ideological movement of today. The bottom line is this: today’s conservatives are possessed by an ideological rigidity that prevents them from governing effectively. They appear unable to understand the function of government in a democracy, and more importantly, they don’t seem to care.

That failure was deconstructed brilliantly in a recent op-ed by Macalester president, Brian Rosenberg. He ended his piece with the $64 thousand question: “Which 'pledge' takes precedence—to 'oppose and vote against all tax increases' or to 'well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter'”?

It's a question that Minnesota’s conservative congressional members would do well to consider also.

Posted in Fiscal Policy | Related Topics: Federal Government  Budget Deficit  Government Shutdown