Tallahassee or Washington, they both share the same nutty, inside-the-Beltway-logic:

When you're in a hole, keep digging.

The country is flat broke. It's borrowing money -- make that more money -- to pay for President Barack Obama's sea-to-shining-sea, high-speed rail fantasy. Just because the money "is out there anyway," just because if Florida doesn't take it someone else will, does that mean the governor and the principled leadership in the Florida Legislature should help him keep digging America in deeper?

Whatever you think of Gov. Rick Scott's decisions so far, you have to admit the man is the real deal. He's keeping his campaign promises. He's going after exactly the things he said he would, and in the way he said he would. Nothing alters his focus.

When he was running for office he pledged an end to the state's dependence on a stimulus fix he believes is destroying America. He said he wants to create permanent jobs by bringing in new businesses and growing existing ones. He wants to lower taxes, end the regulations strangling business growth, balance the state budget and assure Florida of a better future than it has a present.

And, oh, yes. He promised to consider a high-speed rail plan if it were right for Florida and could be paid for without tax dollars. That's a big "if."

Well, he considered it and on three points turned it down. He concluded an Orlando-to-Tampa high-speed rail line is a bad risk for Floridians: Its cost to taxpayers, even bringing in private companies, could approach $3 billion; ridership and revenue projections look to be overly optimistic; and if the federal government decides to shut the project down, the state will have to return the $2.4 billion.

Scott was toast the minute he made the "no high-speed rail" announcement.

The press corps launched into a full-fledged feeding frenzy. Legislators' first instinct was to circle the wagons and say nothing. And high-powered agencies hoping to connect their clients to a slice of the $3 billion rail pie "restrategized" behind closed doors.

Mind you, none of this phased Rick Scott, who most of last week was in his airplane flying somewhere or primping for an interview on national television.

By some accounts -- though not by mine -- his decision to turn down $2.4 billion was courageous. Despite the bad reporting he had to endure, I didn't, I don't, see Scott's decision as a particularly courageous act. For this governor, for the Rick Scott we've watched for nearly 10 months, thumbing his nose at the feds' stimulus money was a natural. It was in character. It was the shoe that fit his Cinderella foot.

More bizarre would have been hearing him accept the feds' money, the risk and rail-building jobs that might not go to Florida contractors and might not make a dent in the state's 12 percent unemployment figure.

Neither was U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio's condemnation of the rail money particularly brave. "This country, this year, will borrow $1.4 trillion to run its affairs," Rubio said Friday. "I cannot go around railing against deficits and debt, and at the same time, on the other side of my mouth, talk about all these projects I want to fund with borrowed money."

Wisely, not bravely said. Again, Rubio is simply repeating the litany of his campaign speeches. He isn't running for office, he's surrounded by admirers, he can say what he likes, what he honestly believes, without raising an eyebrow.

House Speaker Dean Cannon expressed his agreement with Scott's decision and in truth, he ought to be recognized as a hero. He's in a rough spot. Winter Park -- so near the proposed rail line -- is the seat of his district. Though he's been cautious and deliberate in declaring himself, it had to take some guts for the speaker to defend support for Scott's decision to his out-of-work constituents. He may be entirely forgiven if he can sell SunRail to the governor.