Did we really need a summit to figure out how to fix budget?

Nashua Telegraph columnist John Bachman questions why House leadership would hold a Tax Summit, but not give equal attention to state spending.

Every dollar forcibly taken from the private sector is a dollar not available to finance growth and create jobs. Now the Democrats in charge must bob and weave themselves around these obvious facts, but the state budget is still broken due to the spending of Step 1.

A series of federal handouts have obscured the problem, but it is still here. We spend more than we have, and if we take more taxes, unemployment worsens.

It was not always so and it need not be. Most people live within their means and know how to restrain the wants to fund the musts. But politicians have proven they cannot be trusted to do the same. Spending begets power and buys votes, so they spend.