Four Billion Reasons Against Universal Health Care

Just like there are consequences in life, there are consequences in government. The spending party never lasts forever. At some point the bill comes and then those spend, spend, spend politicians start looking at new ways to separate you from your hard earned money. But, don’t take my word for it. Look at what one reasonable Democratic party leader had to recently say about the state of our state finances:

Tim Jennings warned his audience that he is a blunt speaker.

The president pro tempore of the New Mexico Senate indeed pulled no punches in addressing the attendees at the Association of Commerce and Industry‘s business day breakfast in Santa Fe.

“We’re $4 billion in the hole,” Jennings said of the fiscal challenges facing New Mexico. “But luckily we have $360 million in new dollars to solve that, so things are looking up.”

$4 Billion in the hole! Ouch, that’s not a pretty picture. I would suggest that any reasonable person would say, time to stop the spending. Any bill that is up in the legislature that requires new recurring funding should be dead on arrival.

In his State of the State the Governor said:

Our sound financial management of our permanent funds has allowed us to invest more than $3 billion into New Mexico schools and taxpayers. And I’d like to assure those who opposed the investment into our schools – our permanent funds have grown from $9 billion to $15 billion and our schools are benefiting from that investment.

Anyone want to bet how long it is going to take before some of our folks start planning another raid on that permanent fund? My guess is 2009.