“Can you believe it?” said a voice from behind as I left the downtown library and headed west on Grand Avenue. It was my old friend K.C.

“Believe what?” I said. “If you mean the caucuses, they are getting a bit strange. Who would have thought Donald Trump would still be in it? 

“I thought his entertainment value would have expired by now,” I said. “When it comes to the Constitution, he’s a one-man wrecking crew.”

“The only free speech Trump believes in is his own,” K.C. agreed. “When it comes to religion, he only recognizes what he’s comfortable with. If Romney were running, Trump would be trashing Mormons instead of Muslims. 

“It’s like H.L. Mencken said: ‘No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.’ That’s Trump in spades,” K.C. said.

“But the caucuses aren’t what I’m talking about,” he continued. “It’s state government that’s got me worried.”

“Sure,” I said, “the Legislature comes back in a couple of weeks, and there’s always trouble when they’re in town.”

“They start every session,” K.C. grumbled, “with plans for reinventing the economy, saving schools and giving local governments enough resources so they don’t have to compete with the Salvation Army for donations. 

“And they always end by screwing up the economy, failing the schools and punishing everyone else,” he said.

“What I’m really worried about,” he said, “is what happens to all the tax money you and I pay to state government every year.”

“What do you mean?” I said. “You know as well as I that it gets spent on education and infrastructure and stuff like that.”

“Sure,” he said. “But here’s what doesn’t make sense: 

“Inflation is about 2 percent, right?” 

“Technically,” I said, “it’s less than that, if you believe the Consumer Price Index. The last time I looked, it was under 1 percent, but that was mostly because of the big drop in oil prices this year.”

“Let’s say for the sake of argument that it’s 2 percent,” K.C. said.

“OK,” I said. 

“Remember last spring,” he said, “when the Legislature and the governor were fighting about how much to increase state spending to schools?”

“Sure,” I said. “Democrats wanted a 4 percent increase and Republicans only wanted 1.25 percent. They compromised by throwing in an additional $55 million, and then the governor vetoed the extra money.”

“I did some math,” K.C. said, “and that extra $55 million would have bumped the increase from 1.25 percent to about 2.6 percent.”

“So?” I said.

“So,” he said, “if they’d given the schools a full 4 percent, it would have been an increase of about $160 million, split by all the school districts in the state.” 

“Yes,” I said, “we know that. What is your point?”

“My point,” he said, “is that five months into the new fiscal year, state tax collections are running about 4 percent more than a year ago. That’s at least double the inflation rate.”

“That means the Iowa economy is doing well,” I said.

“Maybe,” he said, sounding somewhat doubtful. 

“The bigger issue,” he said, “is the governor cheated Iowa schools out of their fair share of tax collections. If tax collections are up 4 percent, don’t you think Iowa schools should get a 4 percent increase in state money?

“If you’re the governor of Iowa and you believe in improving the schools and in local control of spending, why wouldn’t you give that money to the schools?” K.C. asked.

“So where did that money go?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” K.C. said. “But I saw the other day that corporate tax collections are way down and tax refunds to businesses are way up this year.”