RALEIGH — I got a reminder recently about character and self-reliance when a friend whose work hours have been cut in half revealed he’d rather live on 10 for $1 packaged noodles and without cable TV than apply for food stamps. “My situation is my responsibility, not anyone else’s,” he told me, as he ticked off how he’s cut his family’s expenses to the bone while his employer struggles.

I don’t know why some people respond to difficulty better than others, but I know my friend’s attitude is out of vogue these days. From child care and education to health care, housing, and even our diet, many in society welcome government’s long tentacles. It’s a shame. The nanny state encourages us to expect someone else to solve our problems, provide our needs and wants, and assume responsibility for our poor choices.

My friend won’t have it. He chuckled when I ribbed him about getting a job as a budget consultant to state legislators and Gov. Bev Perdue. His tenure might be short since his ideas would be stark and realistic — exactly what lawmakers need to close a projected $2.7 billion gap between expected revenue and anticipated spending for the 2011-12 fiscal year.

The best lesson he could offer, however, is that North Carolina’s budget hole is just as much a problem of mind-set about government’s role as it is a problem of spending, borrowing, and taxing.

We have a problem of dependence. For years, legislators have been the enablers. Existing programs have been expanded. New programs have been created. Entitlement eligibility has been broadened. State appropriations per person, adjusted for inflation, were $1,250 in 1981. By 2010, the figure reached $2,160.

Last year, as the crisis loomed and the country veered toward $14 trillion in debt, state spending was $1.6 billion more than acknowledged because of federal “stimulus” dollars. And yet, legislators decried a lack of money, and advocates rebuffed calls for restraint.

Today those same advocates issue press releases and write columns that mock plans for cutbacks as extreme, mean-spirited, and a step backward. For them the answer is to continue the same behaviors that got us here. It’s a path every person who manages a home budget knows leads to disaster.

Those who advocate for more spending and intervention have equal disdain for efforts to address another threat to North Carolina’s recovery and the freedom of its citizens — the requirement in the new federal health insurance law that every person buy government-approved health insurance or face a penalty. The interventionists say the law is no different from a state requiring drivers to purchase car insurance.

Wrong.

Not everyone owns or drives a car, and the state doesn’t force people to do either or face a penalty. Driving is a privilege that comes with rules, including having insurance, following the speed limit, and driving on the correct side of the road.

Requiring every person who exercises the right to breathe to purchase a government-approved product is unprecedented. Two federal judges have ruled it unconstitutional. Ultimately, if the law is upheld, it will become the poster child for the slippery slope.

What would prevent the federal government from forcing every American to buy a government-approved vehicle or face a penalty? Or buy government-approved food or face a penalty? Or buy a ticket to a government-approved art exhibit or face a penalty? Or buy a ticket on a government-approved airline or face a penalty?

Nothing.

As U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson of Florida noted earlier this month when he ruled the federal law unconstitutional, even then-Sen. Barack Obama understood the implications and folly of the individual mandate. Vinson referenced Obama’s 2008 statement that “if a mandate was the solution, we can try that to solve homelessness by mandating everybody to buy a house.”

Obama was right about the mandate, and my friend is right about what to do in a financial crisis. North Carolina should heed their words.

Donna Martinez is co-host of Carolina Journal Radio.