AT THE GREATER Providence Chamber of Commerce meeting the other night, 750 people heard Rhode Island’s three most powerful politicians — Governor Carcieri, House Speaker William Murphy and Senate President-elect Teresa Paiva Weed — deliver soothing sounds.

We’re in a down cycle, just as we were in the late 1970s and early 1990s. We’ll come out of it.

The glass is half full. Let’s be optimistic.

The Feds will come to the rescue with stimulus.

We’re going to set aside partisanship and work together.

This is a beautiful place.

We’re poised for great times ahead, thanks to our “knowledge-based economy.”

For years, I’ve listened to similar happy talk over rubber chicken, while some of my colleagues and I — prophets crying in the wilderness, or skunks at the garden party, depending on your perspective — have been warning with curmudgeonly obstinacy that all is not going well, that the numbers don’t add up, that Rhode Island can’t afford the government it has, and that thousands and thousands of people are going to get killed when the roof caves in.

The state’s horrific economy and massive government deficits (with worse on the way) have amply borne out the wisdom of these years of alarms. No political leader can say honestly that he or she had no warning. But you have to wonder if the message will ever get through.

Voters, for example, seem delighted with how Rhode Island is being managed, according to last month’s election. And re-elected politicians were out the other night, raising the specter of “solving” the state’s deficit with more of the very poison that has killed jobs and fueled deficits.

Speaker Murphy warned that, “while we hope to hold the line on taxes,” he and his fellow politicians have not figured out how to balance the budget without raising them.

“Unfortunately, this year, everything’s on the table,” he said.

Everything except, apparently, cutting to the root of the problem, once and for all.

In a packed banquet room, with spotlights dancing over the tables and tuxedo-clad waiters and waitresses delivering plates of food, it is easy to imagine that all is well with Rhode Island.

But anyone looking seriously at the numbers knows otherwise.

The state is running out of money, generating $1 million in new budget debt every day, while suffering a downgrade in its bond rating, raising the cost of borrowing. Our pension deficit, meanwhile, has exploded, thanks to the poor performance of our investments on Wall Street.

Our high taxes have driven away jobs and, with them, the revenues needed to keep the government going. Foreclosures are rampant, investments built on a lifetime of work and sacrifice have crumbled to dust, and people are desperate for work.

And still the politicians smile, knowing that tinkering around the edges each budget cycle will please special interests and all but guarantee the perpetual re-election of the party in power.

Unfortunately, however successful that approach is politically, it is not solving the dire problems we face.

Yes, the economy runs in cycles. But why should Rhode Island, a state of stunning ocean vistas and wonderful amenities located a short distance from New York and surrounded by wealthy, innovative Massachusetts and Connecticut, be suffering with America’s worst unemployment rate (tied with Michigan, home of an auto industry on life support)?

Why does Rhode Island have, on a percentage basis, the nation’s worst state deficit?

The truth is: We’re not simply being dragged along by a bad economy, we’re a leader — perhaps the leader — in government dysfunction.

All the happy talk in the world will not solve the underlying problems afflicting Rhode Island. That will require guts and leadership.

These pages have spelled out for years what must be done: Cut spending to what Rhode Island can afford. Make taxes competitive with (at least) those in neighboring states. Attack the public-employee-pension nightmare, and bring overall benefits for such employees back to earth.

Reform business regulations, including the over-reaching fire code, to make Rhode Island welcoming to job creators. Cut costly mandates to cities and towns. Encourage the municipalities in the state to merge as many of their services as possible. The duplication and waste are terrible.

Obey the constitution by fully implementing separation of powers and get rid of the straight-ticket voting option, so that Rhode Island functions more like other, more progressive and civic-minded states. Focus more on serving students at public schools. Develop the ports. Put a greater percentage of public dollars into higher education and infrastructure repair.

If our leaders did all that, Rhode Island’s terrific advantages would spring to the fore, and we would be poised to boom as never before when hard times ended, reaping tax revenues that would provide all the money we would need for superb government services, including compassionate aid to the needy. As a bonus, residents would be much happier and healthier.

Struggling through another budget cycle without serious reform — with higher taxes that further stress families, drive away residents, kill more jobs, and scare off investment — just promises more misery, and a new round of mindless “optimism” at future Chamber dinners.

Pass the salad dressing, please.

Edward Achorn is The Journal’s deputy editorial-pages editor ( eachorn@projo.com).