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It's a tale of two budgets.

Gov. Martin O'Malley says his masterful effort to balance the state budget for the next fiscal year shows he's acting responsibly and with prudence. No new taxes, no dramatic cuts in spending, no massive layoffs. He's intent on weathering the Great Recession without damaging key state programs.

State Republican leaders in the General Assembly take a different view of the O'Malley budget. He is "kicking the can down the road" by mortgaging the future and using one-time gimmicks. He's ignoring the state's long-term — and growing — 10-figure deficit.

Who's right?

Depending on how you view it, they're both right.

O'Malley's budget chief, Eloise Foster, deserves credit for putting together a $32 billion blueprint that provides added money for health and education, finds a new array of reserves to tap, preserves the state's rainy day fund and keeps most programs pretty much intact during a period of bleak revenue forecasts.

In a remarkable burst of candor, Foster said at a briefing on the O'Malley budget, "We don't have a spending problem. Our problem is one of revenues."

Indeed. There's no lack of spending priorities for a liberal Democratic administration that emphatically believes government spending is the answer to most of society's ills.

Spending definitely is not the problem from O'Malley's perspective. He's not about to decimate education programs and health care for the poor. He won't rein in spending for the environment or natural resources. He's got no intentions of stemming the insatiable demand by higher education for more state dollars.

Yet he's also not about to raise taxes or force local governments to do the same in an election year. Maryland may have a huge revenue problem, but for O'Malley, this is something that can be put off till after he's re-elected.

Re-election is his first priority — and it requires that he reward core constituencies of the Democratic Party in his budget. He wants them happy and eager to work overtime in this year's campaign.

So from O'Malley's perspective, there's nothing wrong with finding a way to continue Maryland's spending largesse through one-time infusions of federal stimulus funds and one-time shifts of various reserve funds.

But the long-term outlook for Maryland grows exceedingly bleak as a result of O'Malley's short-term maneuvers.

Even the governor's own figures show a cumulative deficit during his next term of $8.4 billion. His calculations assume — wrongly — zero inflation between now and 2014. Factor in 3 percent inflation for those years and Maryland's structural deficit nears $11 billion.

It could get far worse. Upgrading wastewater treatment plants will cost at least $660 million more than the anticipated revenue stream. Maryland is tens of billions of dollars short of fully funding its pension and retirement health care programs.

Meanwhile, federal stimulus dollars totaling over $1 billion will start disappearing later this year. O'Malley is counting on another $400 million in stimulus funds that may never materialize. He's also assuming a fairly robust rebound in state tax receipts that may be overly optimistic.

Republicans are correct that the governor is "kicking the can down the road" by not confronting some of these dilemmas now. He has sidestepped the need to revise the state's relationship with the counties. Annapolis no longer can afford to pay 100 percent of teacher pension and retirement health care costs.

The state can't afford to continue to provide large, annual increases in K-12 education aid to the counties (nearly 6 percent a year during O'Malley's second term) or in higher education (4 percent in each of those years).

Nor can the state continue to starve its transportation programs without doing severe harm to the condition of state roads, bridges and mass transit. New revenue is desperately needed, particularly a higher, inflation-sensitive gasoline tax.

No one in the governor's office, though, has the gumption to tell Marylanders the truth. Indeed, O'Malley had the gall to say that even after his re-election he doesn't intend to raise taxes in 2011.

To do that without crimping current spending will mean another round of short-term elixirs that would worsen the longer-term outlook.

At some point, Democrats in Annapolis will have to face the consequences of their selfish actions that ignore fiscal realities to achieve personal political objectives.

There's a chance this might occur in the fall if anger this month in Massachusetts against Democratic conniving and ineptness translates into a national voter revolt.

But for that to happen, Maryland Republicans will have to present constructive alternatives to Democratic overspending and denial of fiscal realities. They can't continue to be the "Party of No."

It will take a combination of long-term spending restraint, greater sharing of expenses by state and county governments and additional revenue sources to close Maryland's horrific structural deficit. It would be nice if politicians in both political parties start leveling with voters. But don't expect that to happen in an election year.

Barry Rascovar is a longtime statehouse columnist. His e-mail address is brascovar@hotmail.com.