There’s an old truth in farming even Connecticut’s earliest settlers knew: don’t eat your seed corn. If you do, there will be nothing to plant next year and you’ll be, to use another old saying, up a creek without a paddle.

Of course this is perfectly obvious, yet every time we have a budget debate, one side or another proposes digging into that corn. They propose to slash education for our children and future, to cut taxes rather than pay down our debts, or to put off needed upgrades and repairs until someone else is footing the bill.

Whatever gloss they give, the facts usually come out, as they have on New Jersey Governor Christie’s controversial decision on the New York rail tunnel. See this excellent analysis by Paul Krugman.