God has created some very tough creatures, capable of surviving: the depths of the Marianas Trench, the Death Zone of Mount Everest, desert wastelands (whether Sahara or Siberia), dismemberment, atomic blasts, and the cold vacuum of high-orbital space.  In his wisdom God did not, however, create the creature that can survive having its food supply cut off.  If that's true of God's creatures, then how much more true is it of the human creation known as government?

Thus, the key to restoring the health of the republic (whether state or federal) lies in cutting taxes and eliminating the waste in government spending.  Unfortunately, the government hasn't existed that has voluntarily reduced itself in size; so the key to putting the government back on its leash is to starve it into submission through constitutionally restricting its "food supply" of taxation.  While we may not be able to do much at present to the federal beast, we certainly have the power, as voting citizens of Michigan, to greatly affect the state beast, and that is where we ought to focus our efforts in any event.

Article 5 of the Michigan Constitution, Sections 18 & 20, requires that the state maintain a balanced budget, and places the ultimate responsibility for this squarely on the shoulders of the governor.  Unfortunately, as KG One has rightly pointed out, this governor has routinely used that executive responsibility to enact temporary measures that result in the creation of "human shields" to justify a tax increase request during the next round of budget negotiations.

The Michigan FairTax Proposal (MFTP) solves this problem - permanently - by requiring that all such requests, and the justification for same, be placed before the voters on a statewide general ballot (I assume during the annual August Primaries) for approval by the state's electorate.  Let me say that again, just to be clear:  Under the MFTP, the only way a tax increase will be allowed to happen in the future is if the voters of this state approve it as a general ballot issue!  This also applies to the resurrection of any tax that the MFTP kills, as well as the attempt to enact any new taxation other than the MFTP.

Likewise, the MFTP rolls back the state budget "bottom line" to the 2006-2007 budget cycle ($41,672,547,100), and allows for that bottom line to increase only at the rate of inflation . . . and nothing else.  What this means is that there will now be a constitutional cap on the amount of money that Lansing is allowed to raise through taxation.  That may not sound like a big deal now, but in a couple of years post-MFTP enactment, when businesses start flocking back to Michigan (why that will be so is the topic of another essay), the tax base is going to increase.  However, as soon as the revenue raised through the FairTax tips that constitutional budget cap, the Legislature is required to reduce the tax rate to the rate necessary to reduce the state's revenue under the constitutional budget cap.

Again, let me be clear:  As Michigan's economy recovers to the point that state tax revenues under MFTP exceed the constitutional budget cap, the State Legislature is constitutionally required to reduce the tax rate!