Ear to the Ground - State News Roundup

Massachusetts Governor, in a stomach-churning display of Machiavellian manipulation joined the ranks of politicians admitting to using the 'financial crisis' as an excuse to implement their radical ideological agenda, by saying "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste".

We often joke about the government solving unemployment by hiring people to dig holes, and others to fill them up. It would seem officials in Indiana didn't get the irony, and are applying for Federal bailout funds to hire people to ... fill in holes.

Wisconsin is considering expanding its sales tax base by lifting tax exemptions on services commonly used by small businesses.

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford has proposed eliminating the corporate income tax and by eliminating tax breaks given to spur certain industries and research. South Carolina could join four other states, Nevada, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming, with no corporate income tax, Sanford said. In addition, Sanford said the state should create an alternate, flat income tax rate — 3.65 percent — funded by a 30-cent increase in the state’s lowest-in-the-nation cigarette tax. Sanford has also asked for a panel to study the inequities in business property taxes.

In North Carolina, bitter and twisted taxpayer-hating members of a commission looking at future road-building, bridge and public transit needs says even higher taxes and fees are needed, on top of the hikes it approved last month.

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell offered a plan yesterday to fill what he says will be an expected $1.6 billion state overspending problem through $500 million in spending cuts, $476 million in reserve funds, and use $174 million from the sale of oil and gas drilling rights in state forestland. The remaining $450 million gap with money from a yet-to-be approved federal aid package.

Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm has said she will minimize spending cuts because of a state aid package she expects from Obama in 2009. State revenues are $540 million less than expected, but Granholm's proposed cuts will be a fraction of that.

Iowa will cut $40 million from its general budget by freezing most hiring, halting out-of-state travel, reducing purchases and making cuts to the state's public universities, Gov. Chet Culver announced Tuesday. Alternatively, he could be cutting $77 million dollars. Have to love the precision of mainstream media.

Arizona will have to write checks for more than $870,000 if all Gov. Janet Napolitano's employees are fired or quit when Jan Brewer takes over early next year.

Apparently believing the best way for a drug-addict to be cured is through more drugs, Kentucky House budget chairman Harry Moberly Jr. is arguing for a tax hike to 'help overcome' its overspending problem.

Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue told state lawmakers Tuesday that he will propose an “aggressive” package of borrowing to build roads, schools, libraries and other facilities to help stimulate Georgia’s struggling economy. The governor would not say how big the package will be. However, even in good economic years he’s generally asked for about $1 billion in borrowing