What heartless conservatives would balance a $1.9 billion state budget shortfall by service cuts to the needy, without any effort to take back the tax favors so long showered upon the rich and well-connected?  Was it the Tea Party extremists?  The right-wing fringe of the Republican Party?  No.  “No new taxes” was this year’s pledge by Massachusetts House Speaker Robert DeLeo, leader of the  dominant Democratic Party.  And DeLeo’s stance was supported by other Democratic legislators — and by newly reelected Democratic Governor Deval Patrick.  

The 2012 state budget as passed was a disaster for children, students, seniors, the disabled; for families, schools, communities;  for anyone who needs state services.  

But not everyone is feeling the pain.  There was no cutback in the corporate welfare budget, a $2.2 billion “black box,” as Auditor Suzanne Bump called it.  Despite ample evidence that business subsidies are ineffective in creating jobs, these so-called “tax expenditures” have, in the last five years, been growing at twice the rate of the service budget, with virtually no oversight or accountability.  A bill attempting to establish some basic disclosure of who is getting this money and what the impacts might be is languishing in the Joint Revenue Committee.  Legislators busy cutting health care and education don’t seem to even want to know what’s being done with the money they’re giving to their business friends.