Matt Blunt Pays The Bills

Although true, this story could be taken the wrong way to abuse Matt Blunt. Could be? Undoubtedly it has already: Cash flow trouble causes state to tap reserves:

Just weeks into its new fiscal year, Missouri government already has been forced to dip into its reserves to make regular payments to public schools.

Officials confirmed Friday that, because of low cash flow, the state transferred $200 million from its reserve fund to its general revenue account on July 19, just 19 days into the state's 2006 fiscal year.

Two days later, the treasurer's office transferred nearly $197 million out of the general revenue fund so the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education could make its regular payments to public schools.

Contrast this with what the previous governor did, which is to not pay the bills:

The state had a similarly low balance of less than $289 million at the start of its 2004 fiscal year. But instead of immediately borrowing from reserves, Democratic Gov. Bob Holden began the year by withholding more than $250 million in spending, much of it from education.

Unfortunately, this will be heralded by opponents as poor governance (Steelman Outs Blunt on Borrow and Spend Approach; Steelman in '08?), but many who seize upon this opportunity to attack Matt Blunt from borrowing to pay the bills on his strict, starve-the-populace budget would instead spend more money.

And either not pay for it or raise taxes to support it.

Matt Blunt makes hard decisions and does what it takes to keep the state of Missouri's government running without tax increases. And if that means short-term borrowing, we at DMB2008 support it (and think that the head of a larger government, say the Federal government could use that kind of leadership.

Hey, isn't there a presidential election coming up in 2008?