EDITORIAL: A hard budget in a hard year
The Daily Advertiser (excerpt)

The fiscal 2011 budget for Louisiana state government is like a bridesmaid's dress. It's widely considered hideous, perhaps purposefully so. But, as long as we only have to wear it once, and if everyone's going to be tipsy at the reception anyway, maybe we can live with it. The garment that came out of the legislative sweatshop this year has a $26 billion price tag. The budget officials who routinely underestimate revenue and then pull a rabbit out of some hat in the session's closing days couldn't do that this year. The state kept hemorrhaging revenue, stuck by a decline in employment, falling energy prices and a generally unhelpful national economy.

Because there was no white knight to save the day this year, things turned contentious. And through it all, there was a nagging little voice that said, "You think this year is bad?" All the signs point to bigger troubles ahead. Even if no bad economic effects materialize as a result of a deepwater drilling moratorium — and the local projections there range from "awful" to "Grapes of Wrath" — Louisiana must still cope with falling revenue, a generally sluggish commercial environment nationally, the federal demand for a bigger share of Medicaid costs, and whatever uncompensated or indirect expense might accrue as a result of the Deepwater Horizon spill.

That's why some members of the House, led by Speaker Jim Tucker, R-Terrytown, wanted deeper cuts than his colleagues in the Senate were willing to sit still for. Tucker wanted four times the slashing that the Senate hoped to enact, and he wanted to repay the money borrowed from the rainy day fund more quickly than the other chamber did. It's impossible to argue with Tucker's reasoning. If the Legislature had such trouble balancing the budget this year, what's it going to like next year, when there's every reason to believe the bad stuff will happen, and only a well-aimed wish can provide substantial help?