Does Georgia have its own Paris Hilton?

That question, though frivolous, is tempting. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain recently ridiculed Sen. Barack Obama as nothing more than a Hilton-like celebrity, following Obama's rave reviews in Europe.

(ENLARGE)

Former Democratic state Rep. E. Wycliffe Orr practices law in Gainesville.

CRAIG SIMONS/Cox Newspapers (ENLARGE)

Gov. Sonny Perdue and Tsinghua University Vice President Xie Weihe, in Beijing this spring, agree to increase research and educational exchanges between Tsinghua and the University of Georgia. Perdue seems to prefer trips to Asia to minding Georgia's problems, the writer says.

For now, our own Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue has apparently become the darling of the Chinese government, making his second trip there in little more than four months.

But maybe starlike adulation for our state's chief executive is not the apt analogy. Perhaps the better comparison is an international refugee. Will our governor seek political asylum from the Chinese government, protecting him from the troubles in his own land? For while he is cavorting in Asia yet again, his state is hanging on the precipice of a huge economic crisis.

Reports abound that the governor's and the Legislature's budget estimates of growth in state revenues at the last legislative session were woefully excessive, despite clear signs to the contrary. Consequently, as declining state revenues reveal the current budget to be pie-in-the-sky, there looms a state budget shortfall that may exceed $2 billion, approaching 10 percent of the total budget. This imbalance presages slashing many state programs. The portents for education, health care and other bread-and-butter aspects of Georgians' daily lives are as obvious as they are ominous. And where is our governor? In the same place that he was at the end of that 2008 legislative session when the final budget was adopted, setting the stage for this impending disaster: China.

Talk about not minding the store. The Georgia Constitution empowers the governor to deal with such situations, including the authority to convene a special session of the Legislature to address mitigation of the impact of such threats upon Georgians. But instead of such hands-on engagement, Perdue is stealing away to China, a convenient escape act.

With little more than issuing a memo from his Office of Planning and Budget directing state agencies to present alternate plans for budget reduction, the governor was off to an international conference. Someone needs to tell our governor, and Legislature for that matter, that when the house is on fire, you don't go on a picnic. Passivity is not a policy. For all the criticism of the U.S. Congress for adjourning for five weeks without addressing the energy crisis, what about here in Georgia? In China, our globe-trotting governor is quoted as saying, "There is much commonality among the challenges we all face."

While that is of course true, it is interesting to compare that with the "citizen of the world" stance in Europe for which Obama was so roundly criticized by the right, including many who no doubt are of the same political stripe as Perdue. Obama is running for president. Perdue is not, at least that we know. The presidency inherently entails foreign policy and thus travel, so there is logic in a presidential candidate's familiarizing himself with world leaders and problems. Such is not the case with a governor.

As for the need to grow Georgia's jobs and economy through forging ties with China, for now that can be delegated to the very state government department designed for that — the Department of Economic Development. The boss needs to have his hand on the helm as we navigate these troubled waters.

Come on home, Governor. While Rome may not quite be burning yet, smoke is on the horizon — and this is no time for fiddlin'.