Everything’s on the table, whatever it is

They say that Maine people don’t pay attention to political campaigns until after Labor Day. If this means that the recent suggestion by the Democratic candidate for the United States Senate to the Republican candidate that they settle their differences in a cow-milking contest went largely unnoticed, this lack of paying attention is but one more example of the good common sense for which Maine people are famous.

Labor Day is here, so it’s time to sit up straight and focus. First, of course, you have some catching up to do on the political discourse that went on while you were frolicking the summer away.

Of the Senate race, we now know, thanks to the many informative television ads offered up by friends of the candidates, that one is a paragon of virtue and a devoted public servant; the other a soulless fiend who dines on the blood of innocents and smells strongly of sulfur. Which is which remains unclear, which may be why Maine cows look so worried these days.

The two races for the U.S. House have been quiet in a seasonally appropriate way, consisting mostly of candidates boasting of endorsements they’ve picked up from organizations you’ve never heard of and individuals you don’t care about. As November nears, expect the soulless fiends to be exposed for their true selves.

But there is political life outside of Congress. In fact, given the dire financial circumstances in which Maine once again finds itself, what happens in the State House next year is a lot more important to Maine people than (no offense intended, Congress) anything that happens in Congress. The size and urgency of the problem is such that one might think the candidates for governor and the 186 seats in the Legislature would have spent their summer littering our fair countryside with bold and definite proposals to a degree the frolicking public could not ignore.

There’s been some littering, but “bold and definite” hardly describes the debris. The proposals offered so far fall into two categories. 1) Everything will be put on the table. 2) State spending must be cut.

Here’s two quick observations for candidates: monkeys could be trained to put everything on a table – what Maine people need to know is what skilled human hands will do with everything once it’s put there; “State Spending Must Be Cut” would be a fine title for a speech – now, how about giving the speech that tells us precisely what would be cut?

(To be fair, two of the four candidates for governor – Democrat John Baldacci and Republican Peter Cianchette – have stated with a modest degree of specificity that they plan to consolidate the dozens of child and family services programs now spread among four departments. The next step would be for them to quit arguing about who thought of it first and to tell us how much money would be saved and what this would do to services. Green candidate Jonathan Carter says he’s still formulating his social services policy, which seems to describe the status of nearly all of his policies. Independent candidate John Michael is too busy giving independence a bad name to bother with policy and stuff.)

To be fair to all candidates (except legislators running for re-election), the current bunch running the show in Augusta isn’t exactly the best role model for decisive action. Back when the $180 million deficit first appeared in late April, the reasonable expectation was that the Legislature, which had adjourned for the session just hours before Gov. King says he found the budget hole, would shoulder its constitutional responsibility and call itself back into special session. Instead, the Legislature bought the governor’s line that more precise numbers and an agreement worked out by leadership were needed first. Now we’re nudging September, the deficit’s grown to $240 million and leadership has yet to work out a blasted thing.

A special session in early summer, months before the election, could have produced not merely a patch to the immediate crisis, but fundamental changes to the taxation and spending policies that caused it (according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 35 of the 42 states with severe deficits had special sessions and did exactly that, but what do 35 other states know?). As a bonus, the vigorous debate on taxation and spending reform such a session would have generated among current officeholders could have been joined by candidates, giving voters unprecedented insight in advance of the election. A special session right before the election could do the same, just not on this planet.

It actually gets worse. The current Legislature and governor are focused solely on the $240 million deficit projected for the rest of the fiscal year, ending next June 30. The projected deficit of $600 million to $1 billion for the next two-year budget cycle they seem quite content to leave to their successors, even though it is the result of their taxation and spending policies. Candidates to be those successors may not have all the answers to this problem, but they could at least complain loudly about being left with it.

Voters inclined to accept the vague assurances of candidates who say they’ll get in there and really shake things up without requiring them to elaborate upon precisely what they’ll shake and how hard might think back eight years. The election of 1994 was held under remarkably similar circumstances: the economy was sour, the budget deficit exceeded $300 million. Election Day produced a new governor and a substantially new Legislature, all taking office amid fuzzy promises that Maine’s rickety taxation and haphazard spending policies would be reformed so that never, ever, again would the state fill a budget deficit with such gimmicks as furlough days for state workers and shoving bills due this year off to the next. There are lots of ways to measure common sense. One is not electing a U.S. senator based upon the ability to milk a cow. Another is not making the same mistake twice.

Bruce Kyle is the assistant editorial page editor for the Bangor Daily News.