State lawmakers have finally agreed to ask voters to hike the sales tax by one cent per dollar.

In general, we support the idea because the fiscal situation is so very dire. But it's hard to get too enthusiastic about the plan when Republicans in the House have already passed a whole new set of tax cuts that will continue to cripple state revenues once the sales tax money starts coming in. It's an utterly irresponsible act because the tax cuts won't even take affect for a few years, which means the people voting on them could be long gone before they need to deal with the consequences. Why not wait a few years to see if we can actually afford those tax cuts? Because then lawmakers couldn't claim that they cut taxes when they campaign. And these days, campaigning takes precedence over governing.

So now it's up to Democrats and what few responsible Republicans are left to stop the tax cuts in the Senate, because if they don't, Gov. Jan Brewer will surely have to sign the package to survive the GOP primary.

The system is very, very broken.