A new report attempts to rank states based on personal and economic freedom.

These state comparisons are really a tenuous task, as there are many demographic and legislative factors that often researchers in some far-away place are not familiar with. One thing's for sure -- if Kentuckians were not so adamant on their personal freedoms like gun rights, we would not rank anywhere as near as high as this report indicates -- No. 27.Some of the commonwealth's tax rates -- including its property tax rates -- are lower than some surrounding states.

This report, however, also contains some outdated statements. For example, it states that "telecom has been deregulated."

But anyone who has even cursorily followed the 2013 session of the Kentucky General Assembly knows that that the last time telecom deregulation was passed was before the iPhone had even hit the marketplace. If deregulation passed in 2006 counts toward economic freedom in the Kentucky version of this report, what other outdated material in other states might there be?

A much-better indicator of where our state stands in terms of its economic freedom can be found in the institute's release yesterday of an op-ed by Brian Strow, Ph.D., a member of the Bluegrass Institute Board of Scholars, who noted that Kentucky "now has the second lowest bond rating in the country --  ahead only of delinquent and incompetent Illinois."

Few things threaten the economic security of our commonwealth like the gi-normous $34 billion unfunded pension liability.

Despite what some academic-type sitting in his ivory tower says, this state does not have a more sound fiscal policy than 30 other states in this union.