JOAN VENNOCHI
Romney's real agenda is nationalTHE GOVERNOR of Massachusetts is leading the charges against gay marriage, promoting the death penalty, and advocating a new tax cut. That is not the agenda of a governor who is putting the common good of the Commonwealth ahead of his own political ambition. No, Mitt Romney's true agenda has little to do with the people of Massachusetts. It is one large, irresponsible pander to a national Republican audience.
How obvious can he get? The first signs of life appear in the Massachusetts economy and the governor calls for a $225 million tax cut. The state budget is still getting sliced, health care costs continue to rise, and a court suit revealing disparities in education across the Commonwealth is likely to result in a court order for more state spending on schools. Instead of showing true statesmanship and a willingness to invest in the state he has moved back to in order to run for governor, Romney once again plays to a partisan national crowd. A tax cut is not what Massachusetts needs right now. Says Michael J. Widmer, president of the nonpartisan Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation: "We're a long way from being out of the fiscal woods. We still face a structural deficit of several hundred million dollars in 2005, and we have major obligations in health care and education that we must meet before considering a tax cut." Romney is trafficking in national self-promotion at the expense of local progress. His grand fight against gay marriage has been reduced to an embarrassing effort to apply a 1913 law designed to stop interracial marriages to same-sex couples. That is especially sad for the son of George Romney, a progressive governor of Michigan who marched with civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and helped create the Michigan Civil Rights Commission. Then there is the plan for the infallible Romney death penalty, guaranteed to kill only guilty people. If only Romney's passion for infallible policy extended to all the law-abiding living. But Romney's call for a tax cut is his most callow and callous pronouncement to date. For two years he argued that Massachusetts should make cuts to balance the budget. So the state cut spending. For two years Massachusetts led the nation in cutting funding for K-12 education. Massachusetts was a national leader in cutting higher education. During the fiscal crisis, Massachusetts also cut public health by more than 25 percent. Now state revenue is picking up. Does Romney propose to reverse any cuts in education, health care, and basic human services? Of course not. That might be good for some Massachusetts residents, but not so good for Romney. His election promise that he would not cut core government services was empty. Reform is not the real Romney agenda. The goal is to shrink government, no matter who is hurt by the shrinking. Is that what most Massachusetts voters want? It might be. But the governor should be honest about the agenda rather than posturing and pontificating about reforming government waste and inefficiency. Last January the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, which provides independent research analysis of state budget and tax policies, put out a report entitled "Cuts that Hurt: An Examination of Painful Cuts in the FY2004 State Budget." Among those listed: funding for early childhood education, funding to monitor compliance with the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Air Act, and funding for public health, housing, and income support programs. On April 30 the House of Representatives passed a budget that would increase spending for human services. Legislators are inclined to restore some funding, but there is Romney making headlines with irresponsible calls for tax cuts. Mitt Romney's ideology is not the problem. It's his lack of commitment to Massachusetts. He is looking far beyond the Bay State, no matter how often or how loudly he denies it.
Joan Vennochi's e-mail address is vennochi@globe.com. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
|
