'Ah, The World of illusion ...'

"No matter how many coats of lipstick you put on a pig, it's still a pig." *

The Roanoke Times this morning makes a feeble effort (in an editorial entitled, "Virginia Is Not Awash In Cash") to lather some more lipstick on that hog-of-a-budget-surplus and to explain away the fact that the state of Virginia is awash in cash:

Let's put to rest the most tired refrain in the Virginia budget impasse: "Legislators shouldn't even think about raising taxes when the commonwealth has a billion-dollar surplus."

Surplus or no, the commonwealth is not awash in cash.

Well. The numbers we're watching grow exponentially are all wrong. The learned economists at the Roanoke Times say so. That surplus - now up to $1.4 billion and growing - isn't really cash that the state has not been able to spend; it's ... well ... it just isn't. It's actually cash that is needed for expenditures ... someday.

Reminds me of Pharoah's oft-spoken incongruous decrees in the movie, "The Ten Commandments":

"So it shall be written, so it shall be done."

Or the frenetic commands of The Great and Powerful OZ in "The Wizard of Oz":

“Don't look behind the green curtain! Ignore the man behind the green curtain!”

Here's the irreality a la Roanoke Times:

Surplus or no, the commonwealth is not awash in cash. Needs continue to outstrip resources in many areas -- not just the transportation shortfall that gets the most ink.

"Needs continue to outstrip resources." Yeah. Right. For the folks at the Times, I offer up two definitions I learned in Econ 101":

Surplus: A sum of cash (resources) a state government has remaining after all obligations (needs) are met.

Awash: When that surplus exceeds $1.4 billion.

To the genius who thought he could make it seem to be something other than what it obviously is - nice try.

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone," it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."

"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many things."

"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master -- that's all."**

* Author Unknown
** Lewis Carroll, "Through the Looking Glass."