Jeff Woodhead: ‘Fiscal ship’ costly

Regarding the Jan. 27 column “Righting the fiscal ship of state”: I am glad that J. Peder Zane is setting the record straight.

We should all celebrate the accomplishment of balancing the state budget! Never mind that it came with tax hikes on vulnerable North Carolinians, out-of-work teaching assistants and an attitude toward teachers that makes Ebenezer Scrooge look like a philanthropist.

Or that the people who did it also pointlessly restricted voting rights and health care for those North Carolinians unfortunate enough to be women, relished using our LGBT neighbors as punching bags and turned down free money so they could leave thousands of people without health insurance.

We can and should ignore those who look at our newly “righted” fiscal ship and see a barnacle-ridden mess. Government isn’t meant to serve them anyway; it is meant to serve the ledger, and the ledger is all that matters.

This story was originally published February 6, 2016 at 1:00 PM with the headline "Jeff Woodhead: ‘Fiscal ship’ costly."