By: R.J. Moeller

From The Chicago Sun-Times this past week:

The party - if this primary was ever a party - is over.

And now we must deal with the mother of all hangovers: the state’s projected $13 billion deficit.

For months, politicians on the campaign trail have been talking about the state’s record deficit, pontificating on how they’d fix it and lamenting the devastating impact this budget crisis is having on schools, universities and social services across Illinois.

Talking, we must emphasize, but doing nothing about it.

Meanwhile, those hapless schools, universities and social service agencies had been standing by, waiting for the state to pay its bills — for classes already taught, drug treatment already given, home health care already provided — but the state hasn'’t ponied up because, quite simply, it doesn'’t have the money.

It never seems to occur to liberals and other champions of Keynesian Economics that perhaps a significant part of the reason we have such staggering deficits and debt in states such as Illinois is precisely because the state government bit off more than it could chew a long time ago.

Certainly corruption on a state-wide level doesn't help matters, but it might also just be that the effect (government-funded entities not having enough of the tax-payer's money to pay their bills) is actually the cause of our fiscal woes.

To their credit, The Sun-Times editorial did recommend cuts to Medicaid and overall spending, but insists that a dramatic increase in income tax rates is absolutely necessary. Welcome to European-style politics, America! We're going to promise you massive social programs, spend like drunken sailors, and when the tab can't be paid, you'll end up with less of everything (including the dollar amount on your paycheck).