The Ledger: Texas Not a Good Economic Role Model For Gov. Scott, Florida

A recent letter to the editor extolled the virtues and accomplishments of Gov. Rick Scott.

Rick Scott sent a request to Republicans across Florida. His request was that they send a letter he wrote to newspaper editors across the state, passing the words off as their own.

On a recent night there was a story on the Colbert Report saying “Now those anti-government tea partiers who elected Rick Scott can have the government write their letters for them.”

The letter to The Ledger also commended Gov. Scott for using Texas as a model for Florida.

Barbara Bush, in a letter to the Houston Chronicle on Feb. 5, said: “Our schools are in crises: We rank 36th in the nation in high school graduation rates. An estimated 3.8 million Texans do not have a high school diploma. We rank 49th in verbal SAT scores, 47th in literacy and 46th in average math SAT scores. We rank 33rd in the nation on teacher salaries.”

And this from Paul Krugman on Jan 6, “Wasn’t Texas supposed to be thriving even as the rest of America suffered? Didn’t its governor declare, during his re-election campaign, that “we have billions in surplus?” Yes, it was, and, yes, he did. But reality has now intruded, in the form of a deficit expected to run as high as $25 billion over the next two years.

Florida, too, has structural tax problems. Tax exemptions for any business with enough lobbyists to write a bill and enough clout to get it passed are commonplace. Lottery and tobacco settlement money has been used in the general fund even though all was supposed to be for education.

So, I am not optimistic about our future here in the “government in the sunshine” state where budget signings are held as private events and Democrats are ejected by law enforcement because they weren’t invited.

RICK WADE

Lakeland