Despite the fact that this year’s State of the State address by Governor Richardson was billed to be his shortest to date. It still seemed a bit long to me. Then again, I always have a hard time continuing with the speech after the Governor begins spewing nonsense:
New Mexico has always been fiscally responsible.
Unlike Washington, New Mexico cannot run a deficit, nor overspend.
We must have a balanced budget.
And we have balanced the budget every single year.
If New Mexico can’t overspend, you have to wonder how we got ourselves into this pickle. Oh wait, no wondering needed. I know exactly how we ended up here. We took one time funds and created recurring expense obligations – one after another after another. There are the obvious examples like the Rail Runner and the Spaceport, and there are many more not so obvious examples, like continually throw money at education without expecting a single result.
There’s been a lot of talk about increasing taxes this session, but the shot heard round the world should serve as a warning to those that prefer tax raising over spending cuts.
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nEoW-P81-0]