Hey Gov -- How About EFFECTIVE Government?

I heard an interview with Gov. Beshear yesterday, and I was struck by his definition of success. When asked to identify some of the signature wins of his first two years, he noted "we've shrunk the size of government."

Sound good to you? Then imagine this -- at a press conference in 2011, someone asks Coach Cal to identify the signs that the Cats are making progress, and he says, "We've cut the number of players on scholarship!"

Here's a news flash for the Gov and for anyone else who has drunk the "government is bad" koolaid --

It's not about big or small government; it's about effective government. And Kentucky continues to suffer from one of the most ineffective governments in the country.

You measure UK basketball by wins, championships, banners, and NBA lottery picks. Is it too much to expect to measure government the same way: by the number of wins it achieves for its citizens, and by how much it moves the needle on progress across the Commonwealth?

Cutting the size of government isn't good if the cuts you've made move us backward. And backward is where we are going. In education, in smoking rates, in health, in obesity, in jobs, in poverty, in drop-out rates -- in every metric I can think of that measures the effectiveness of government, we are moving backward. If this state were a basketball team, we would already have forfeited the season.

David Williams and the Republicans deserve their share of blame, of course. Their man-crush on Grover Norquist has gutted the state budget at a time when we need MORE government leadership, not less. But the Gov plays right into their hands when he identifies smaller government as a mark of success.

It's time to talk about success as moving forward, as making a difference for our people. The citizens of Kentucky deserve a government that works, that is effective, not just one that desperately tries to hold on to what it's got -- its perks, its patrons, its power structure -- even while the state continues to move backward. We need bold leadership, with bold ideas.

And I don't think "we got smaller!" qualifies as bold leadership.