We all know that numbers can be used to prove just about any point you are determined to prove.

We came across an excellent example several weeks ago in a essay appearing in another newspaper.

Rep. Ken Fletcher, R-Winslow, complained in the Kennebec Journal that Democrats running Maine continue to spend more and more money.

“The people of Maine have been told that state government has cut spending ‘to the bone,'” he wrote.

“Recently released expenditures for the fiscal year ending on June 30 actually showed that total state government expenditures increased by $193 million compared to 2009,” Fletcher wrote.

“Only in Augusta can a 2.6 percent spending increase be spun as a spending cut.”

He went on to say that during the last eight years of Gov. John Baldacci’s control, total expenditures have increased by $2.3 billion, or 43 percent.

This struck us as remarkable, considering all the furlough days for state employees and cuts to local governments and schools.

So, we checked the numbers. There’s a bit more to the story.

Fletcher apparently chose to lump together state and federal revenue.

The Recovery Act approved by Congress resulted in a $1 billion increase in federal spending in Maine in 2009 and 2010. The lion’s share of which went to boost Medicaid spending, to extend unemployment benefits and for worker retraining, all meant to help people affected by the recession.

In effect, the only way the Baldacci administration and the Legislature could have kept total spending flat, as Fletcher seems to be suggesting, would have been to turn down the extra federal money for those people.

Of course, no governor or Legislature in the country — or in their right mind — has chosen to do so.

Generally, what the governor and Legislature are responsible for controlling are the General Fund, Highway Fund and Other Special Revenue Funds, all of which are down year to year.

The only thing that pushed overall spending higher was a 13.4 increase in federal funding triggered by the recession.

According to the Office of Fiscal and Program Review, General Fund spending between 2009 and 2010 is down in just about every category, from Aid to Education to Judiciary, to Marine Resources to Environmental Protection.

As Fletcher noted, total spending is up 43 percent during the eight years of the Baldacci administration. What he fails to note, however, is that practically all of that is due to increased federal revenue.

The argument can be made that federal spending is out of control, and it is. Or it can be argued that General Fund spending in Maine would have increased apace had it not been for the recession. It probably would have.

Or, finally, it can be argued that many of the state budget cuts were passed along to other levels of government.

All good arguments. But to infer that Maine state government didn’t trim its wings between 2009 and 2010 is just plain wrong.

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