david yepsen, who has claimed the title of Poopyhead Of The Year for 3 years running, surprises the state with his column today on how the republicans in iowa have abused the trust of it's citizens. astonishing actually because i never thought i'd see the day when he would go after people in his own party. but he did. and did a bang-up job doing it.

Republicans in the Iowa House are deadbeats. They don't pay their debts.

Recently, the GOP majority in the Iowa House released its budget plan for the coming fiscal year. Buried in the fine print was this fact: They don't intend to repay about $1.5 billion in various trust funds they've pilfered in recent years to make their budgets balance.

We know Republicans in Washington are losing their fiscal discipline. It looks as if the virus is spreading to their cousins at the state Capitol.

At issue is the state's practice of spending more than it collects in annual revenues. It's done that for the past eight years by taking one-time money from various cash reserves, emergency funds and trust funds.

House Republicans propose to just walk away from about $1.5 billion of this debt and never repay it. They plan to stiff the tobacco settlement fund, part of which was to be used to curb smoking and defray the cost of it to Iowa. Other funds that won't be repaid include ones for the environment, state and school infrastructure, underground storage tank cleanups, Area Education Agencies, trails, ground-water protection, brucellosis and tuberculosis eradication, snowmobile, value-added agriculture, victims compensation, waste tire removal, hospitals and aviation.

In other words, the taxes and fees Iowans have paid into various trust funds over the years for specific things have wound up being used for something else.

It seems you just can't trust a trust fund.

GOP leaders say they don't want to raise taxes to repay the funds. Fine. They don't need to. Tax revenues are pouring into the state coffers at better than expected rates. Last week the Legislative Services Agency said tax revenues are running a hefty 6.8 percent ahead of last year. That's a bigger raise than most workers are getting. If lawmakers simply hold the line on spending, they'll have money for reserve funds. If they raise the cigarette tax, they'll have even more.

It's sad to see Republicans become people who walk away from their obligations. Their candidates are fond of campaigning for office as champions of "traditional Iowa values." Isn't repaying your loans a traditional Iowa value? Isn't keeping your word - trust - a traditional Iowa value?

Taking money from Iowans for one purpose and then using it for something else may be quite justifiable on a temporary, emergency basis. Making it a permanent thing just makes people cynical. In business, it's called fraud.

Republicans also like to posture themselves as people who bring good Christian principles to public office. That's commendable. One of those principles is that during good times you set aside something for the lean times ahead.