Anyone who believes the property tax "is probably the worst funding mechanism" to pay for New Hampshire's government is someone who does not understand or care about the New Hampshire Advantage.

Anyone who holds such a belief and who is also the new Democratic speaker of the New Hampshire House of Representatives is someone to be very, very worried about.

Saying the property tax is the "worst funding mechanism" reminds us of what Winston Churchill often said of democracy. It was, he said, the worst form of government -- until it was compared to every other form!

That goes double for property taxes. They are for the most part locally raised and locally spent. They are painful to raise, which is why politicians loathe them. They cannot raise them easily, because they are raising them from their neighbors. And those neighbors also see what is being doing with the money.

How much easier it would be for the politicians to have a broadbased sales or income tax! The tax would be raised from afar (Concord) and the monies it would bring in would be stupendously large. Think of what a savvy politician could do with such a huge new income source.

Remember, too, that the property tax, that "worst funding mechanism," wouldn't go away. As has happened in every state where income and/or sales taxes have been enacted, the property taxes continue to increase.

Which is why New Hampshire taxpayers should be very, very concerned that Democratic Rep. Terie Norelli of Portsmouth is now speaker of the New Hampshire House.

Do not believe for a minute her claim, made last week to the Concord Monitor, that she won't try to impose her tax views.

She won't do it directly, of course. Instead, she and her new-found majority will try in every way possible to lard up state spending in the hopes that, soon enough, there will be no answer but to enact the income or sales tax that they so devoutly want.

Gov. John Lynch, newly reelected on a pledge to veto such a tax, is going to have to do more than stick to his pledge.

He is going to have to make the tough choices this time around. That is going to put him at odds with his new speaker and much of his party.

But it will keep him on the same side as the taxpayers.