Because Washington state will always be home no matter how far I wander, I keep abreast of local news, which is why I’m appalled at The Herald’s “Holding Boeing accountable” editorial. With friends like you, Boeing doesn’t need enemies.

Shedding crocodile tears over the lack of legislative traction for Rep. June Robinson’s bill tying Boeing tax breaks to employment numbers is misplaced. The bill is an economic and business disaster. With legislative thinking like that, Washington will become an anti-business, anti-job basket case like New Jersey, where I currently reside.

Of course Boeing unions love the bill since it would encourage the company to pad the payroll with no-show, feather-bedding jobs and kill aggressive cost control.

If you want to see who is responsible for job losses and lousy tax policy in Washington, go to Olympia and watch the Legislature, which I did daily for several years. For it to lecture Boeing on how to run its business and create jobs and economic prosperity is the height of hypocrisy.

When it comes to taxation, I start from Nobel laureate Milton Friedman’s premise: “I am in favor of cutting taxes under any circumstances and for any excuse, for any reason, whenever it’s possible.”

The state doesn’t have a problem with anyone’s taxes being too low — it has a problem with government spending unwisely and too much.

Whether Boeing, the Joe Smith Company or Jane Taxpayer, I don’t care how, why or where — their taxes should be cut.

Scott St. Clair

Belleville, N.J.