Several weeks ago, in response to a column I wrote about the problems now plaguing the Kansas economy, a reader posted a comment that I didn’t know what a “true” conservative was and that my statement that Gov. Brownback was not acting like a traditional conservative politician was false.

The announcement of the June tax receipts, $28 million below the estimates, and the final total tax receipts for the just closed fiscal year, $338 million below the estimates, makes it absolutely clear that Brownback, members of the Kansas Legislature who hastily and intemperately voted for the draconian tax cuts, and anyone else who supported these cuts, have betrayed one of the principal tenets of traditional American conservative thought: “fiscal responsibility.”

There is a fundamental difference between believing that taxes should be reduced no matter what cost and believing that unnecessary taxes and unnecessary government functions supported by those taxes should be eliminated. I would suggest that President Ronald Reagan, whom most Americans believe to have been one of the great conservative American presidents, subscribed to the latter theory.

Reagan opposed unnecessary government activities, unnecessary government regulation, and the taxes used to support them. He did not attempt to eliminate all taxes. He understood that some traditional “core” functions of the federal government, such as defense, not only required support, but needed increased financial support, and that meant that some tax base was necessary to achieve this.

As I see it, Brownback and the Legislature have not only made fundamental mistakes about how our economy functions and the necessity of maintaining an adequate tax base, but, also, have refused to openly discuss the effects of their mistaken agenda. What is happening is quite clear: State tax revenues cannot support Kansas governmental functions as they presently exist. Core functions of state government — or at least functions that were considered to be core — such as corrections, law enforcement, highways, education and some social services, will need to be reduced or even eliminated in the next few years unless tax revenues substantially increase.

Revenue figures and other economic indicators — as well as most objective economists doubt this will happen. Thus, within the next few years, unless the tax cuts are delayed or reversed, there will need to be sweeping reductions in state-funded services. These will have to be replaced either by locally funded services, requiring a substantial rise in property taxes, or the services will just disappear. Are we prepared to see prisons close, universities shut down, highways deteriorate? Will such a situation encourage businesses to move to Kansas?

While I think that it would be folly were current core state functions permitted to be dramatically reduced or eliminated, one can certainly make arguments in favor of such a thing happening. What I find to be infuriating is that the governor and his supporters are not admitting to this or willing to debate the wisdom of such a policy, but, rather, continue to cast blame for the state’s fiscal problems on others, and continue to insist that “things” will turn around.

This rather reminds me of someone jumping off a cliff and saying “don’t worry, the wind will lift me up and carry me to safety so that I am not crushed on impact with the ground.” It is time for us all to demand open, honest policy discussions, the disclosure of the true political agendas of those participating in the debate, and a strong dose of realism about the economic and social catastrophe to which our beloved state is being driven.