Minn. Gov. Tim Pawlenty likened the federal government to a drug dealer, exposing the coercion states face when dealing with spending tied to federal mandates, such as ObamaCare.

The “federal government’s acting increasingly like a financial drug dealer, handing out tastes, or free samples, trying to get people addicted, further addicted,” said Pawlenty on Fox News. “And we’ve just had it. We’re not taking the bait anymore, we’re not taking the free samples anymore. This is an executive order that says, we’re sending them a strong message, but we’re also going to try to make sure the policies are for Minnesota. Not because some big federal bureaucracy tells us what to do.”

This week, Pawlenty told state agencies “not to submit applications to any health care funding from the federal government related to the health care overhaul,” reported the Star Tribune.

Pawlenty’s move may be criticized by some as evidence of his 2012 presidential ambitions. Whatever his motivations, the encroachment of the debt-laden federal government on the states in the areas of entitlement spending is unsustainable.

“To the question of which level of government should choose the size and shape of entitlement programs, the clear answer is the states,” Jeffrey Miron, a Cato Institute fellow, wrote this summer in Politico. “Competition among them would generate better programs and limit the excesses of federal spending.”