I've tried to cut Gov. Dan Malloy some slack this tough budget season, as he tries to navigate the treacherous shoals of Connecticut's disparate populations, wealthy towns, poor cities and powerful and needy unions representing government workers.

I might give him some progressive points for his attempt in his new budget proposal to divert state money from wealthier suburban communities to budget-challenged cities, aiming at, among other things, more educational parity.

But one big tax increase lurking in the governor's new budget proposal is one that undermines all his progressive credibility.

The governor's proposed 45-cents-a-pack increase in the cigarette tax is an offensively regressive tax, undermining any credit he might get for trying to help the poor of Connecticut's cities.

Indeed, the governor's Robin Hood plan, to rob wealthy suburbs of state subsidies and direct them to the cities, is pushing that money to local governments largely run by Democrats.

And those new state subsidies will help power the union machines that hum at the municipal level.

But when it comes to the real poor of those cities, Gov. Grinch seems to have no mercy.

The proposed cigarette tax increase, which would tie Connecticut with New York for the highest in the country, at $4.35 a pack, targets the people who least can afford it, addicts no less.

Some studies show that some poor addicted cigarette smokers pay to up to 25 percent of their income on smoking.

To attack these most vulnerable of Connecticut citizens, horribly addicted, with this bludgeon of a new tax, as the rich get a pass on any new Malloy taxes, is unconscionable.

It's not hard to understand how the underprivileged, who struggle to make ends meet day by day, often living from one inadequate paycheck to another, find it harder to quit smoking than the more comfortable middle and upper classes.

There are plenty of statistics to help the governor understand, though, that his regressive tax increase, which he expects to raise close to $60 million, is aimed at the people who least can afford it.

What about fairness?

What about new taxes on all those yachts floating around Connecticut harbors, or on the Mercedes Benz SUVs crowding Connecticut highways?

No, our governor is reserving his harshest tax increase for the people who will be hit hardest by it.

This is a familiar well for Connecticut politicians to tap.

The state unapologetically raised its cigarette tax routinely during the last decade, in increments from 25 cents a pack to $1.

The justification, of course, is that the state is taxing people to help them, that the higher taxes will encourage them to quit.

Clearly that has not been the history. Indeed, the continuing sales with the new higher taxes are built into the budget forecast of increasing revenue. The governor, with the new smoking tax, expects to take in $413 million in cigarette tax revenue in the new budget.

This leads to the other dirty secret about Connecticut's willingness to prey on its most needy, the addicted. The state also ranks dead last in the country for helping smokers give up the habit.

In fact, the state, which spends zero on smoking cessation programming, gets an "F" from the American Lung Association in this category.

By targeting poor, vulnerable residents and taxing them on the very thing to which they are addicted, without offering any medical help to beat the addition, is morally bankrupt.

With this especially cruel tax, the governor loses any moral high ground he might otherwise achieve in his budget proposal.

Shame on him for this tax proposal.

This is opinion of David Collins.

d.collins@theday.com