In his seventh State of the State address today, Gov. Bob Taft will focus on the legacy he will leave in Ohio's history books. That legacy, unfortunately, will be one of a growing deficit and an increasingly inflexible state government. With future revenues projected to drop thanks to tax cuts and a reformed tax code, legislators are left with no choice but to cut social services to ensure the state's books end up in the black.
Unlike the federal government, Ohio cannot, according to its constitution, spend money it does not have. Without this safety net of deficit spending, the state must pay all creditors when the bills come in every two years. So, when the elected officials in Columbus see all the red ink come June, they clamor to cut whatever they can -usually benefits to veterans, the uninsured and the poor -to make money coming in equal money going out.
As Taft's spokesman Orest Holubec told a Plain Dealer reporter, the governor will introduce a tax plan that would bring in $800 million less than current tax levels would. Another of Taft's proposals is lowering the penny sales tax -which is set to expire anyway -to just half of a penny, only to pacify small government hardliners in the General Assembly. Cutting dental and optical benefits for Medicaid recipients has also been floated as a way for the state to tighten its fiscal belt. Other solutions include charging Ohioans user fees -such as a $5 parking fee at state parks -and reorganizing the state's regulatory boards.
Medicaid takes up 40 percent of Ohio's budget. Dental and optical benefits comprise 2 percent of that -about $140 million. Reorganizing regulatory boards would save an estimated $32 million.
Ohio spends about $25 billion in tax revenue each year. The savings from the proposed cuts -$172 million -add up to less than 1 percent of the total budget.
These cuts are hardly visible when one considers the state's entire budget. While they may make sense in the Republican economics textbook, here in the reality of the Buckeye State the problem does not fix itself so easily. A company cannot save itself from Chapter 11 by skimping on pencils and Post-it Notes. Cutting taxes in the face of budget shortfalls is ridiculous and narrow-minded. Nickel and diming the citizens of Ohio is not going to solve any of the state's budget woes, and Taft must realize that. In seven years, he has done nothing but lead this state and its people down a road of ruin. Come 2006, anything short of a J. Kenneth Blackwell administration would be better than this.
Protecting the messenger
What a relief it was last week to hear of a positive development in the U.S. news game -after a discouraging year for the media in 2004, Congress is starting its term well by considering a new law that would protect journalists from overzealous federal judges and prosecutors. Called a shield law and sponsored jointly by Republican Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana and his Democratic colleague Rick Boucher of Virginia, it would require federal courts to meet new, stringent standards before it could force journalists to reveal confidential sources. Congress should pass it as soon as possible.
The Free Flow of Information Act would put into law a set of informal Justice Department guidelines that govern how prosecutors treat reporters. The guidelines say that courts must exhaust every effort to get information from sources before going to reporters and that they cannot be compelled to reveal confidential sources. Last year, federal courts subpoenaed reporters for Time and The New York Times and threatened them with jail for not revealing confidential sources, and a federal judge sentenced one reporter in Rhode Island to six months of house arrest for not naming names. This sort of trend only discourages people from sharing what could be important secrets.
Some 31 states -including Ohio -and the District of Columbia have shield laws, which protect journalists who report information given to them by people who want to be anonymous. Most journalists prize openness, and reporters almost always encourage people to identify themselves, but in certain situations, this is not possible. If sources reveal damning information about an influential person or inside knowledge about the misdeeds of a powerful institution, making them identify themselves invites retribution. In criminal cases, such retribution can be deadly. A federal law that allows some sources to remain unnamed encourages people to come forward and will inject some life into America's flagging climate of free information.
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