SO
WHEN, FOR instance, he says this nation
has got a deficit because we have been through
a war, people might begin to wonder
whether he is telling the truth. They might
wonder if the 13 percent state-college tuition
hike in Maryland or the $1 billion state-tax
increase in Ohio or the state Medicaid crisis
now raging from coast to coast might have
something to do with priorities in Washington.
If Bush loses, it wont be on yellowcake
uranium but on let them eat cake
economics.
Yes, the president
acknowledges that the economic downturn might
also have contributed something to the eye-popping
$455 billion budget deficit announced last
week, the largest ever. But God forbid he
admits that his huge tax cuts are in any way
relevant. That would risk saying something
inconvenient and true. The nonpartisan Congressional
Budget Office says that Bushs tax cuts
have cost the Treasury nearly three times
as much as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq,
reconstruction after September 11 and homeland-security
measures combined. Tax cuts = 9/11 + war x
3. And the numbers get much worse in the years
ahead as baby boomers retire. In other words,
even if the tax cuts help stimulate a modest
recovery, we have dug ourselves a deep hole.
Online
Mail Call: Our Readers Discuss Bushs
Tax Cuts

Its a hole
that the statesrequired by law to balance
their budgetsare now being forced to
fill. The tobacco-settlement money is gone;
the rainy day funds exhausted.
Under intense pressure from the governors,
Washington ponied up $20 billion in emergency
aid, but added tax breaks for corporations
that will cost the states billions. The House
just passed a plan for health savings accounts
that will set the states back another $33
billion if enacted. And thats not even
counting the monster haunting every governor,
every nightunfunded mandates.
To take just one example that is relevant
in school districts across the country: special
education. Congress pledged it would pay for
40 percent of the cost; it actually covers
17 percent. In California alone, where nearly
half the budget goes to K-12 education, thats
more than a billion dollars the state has
been stiffed on.
Im no Gray
Davis fan, but lets be honest about
the facts. While some states have been mismanaged,
most are simply contending with rapidly growing
numbers of hurting people who need their services.
Those services are now being slashed almost
everywhere. Nineteen statesall of them
facing sharply increasing demandwill
have smaller budgets than last year, not just
smaller budget increases. But telling a laid-off
mother with three kids that she cant
see a doctor will not be enough. Governors
and state legislatures are taxing everything
that moves. Even the most conservative states
are doing so. Republican Gov. Bob Riley of
Alabama, a devout Christian, says raising
taxes on the wealthy to help the poor is what
the Bible compels. Hes had enough of
so-called religious politicians who turn Christs
commandments on their head.
Explaining all
this politically is a bank shot,
to use a billiards term. It requires trusting
the voters with complexity. Will they see
that their new $400 child credits are chump
change compared with all the new fee hikes
and service cuts? Will they understand that
theyre paying more in state and local
taxes so that a guy with a Jaguar putting
up a McMansion down the block can pay less
in federal taxes? Will they connect those
30 kids cramming their childs classroom
to decisions in faraway Washington?
Its hard
to tell, but the Democrats better try to develop
that connective tissue. The reason I have
not yet written off John Edwards is that he
is quietly devoting his campaign to this theme.
In New Hampshire last week, he raised Bushs
unfunded mandates in education: The
result is that your property taxes have to
be raised, and thats a huge mistake.
President Bush
is a regular guy who doesnt care a
whole lot about regular people. The first
is a political asset; voters like his guyness.
The second is his greatest vulnerability,
and he offers more evidence for it almost
every day. Remember how he promised last winter
to get rid of a loophole that allows U.S.
companies with homeland-security contracts
to unpatriotically incorporate in Bermuda
to avoid taxes? The loopholes still
there. Remember how he promised to expand
national-service opportunities for patriotic
young Americans by 50 percent? Last weekdespite
bipartisan action in the Senatehe still
hadnt lifted a finger in the House
for a measly $100 million to keep AmeriCorps
from being slashed by 40 percent, leaving
kids untutored and after-school programs facing
closure. Who is he for first? The question
is not just if the president tells the truth
but if the truthfinallywill
be told about him.
© 2003
Newsweek, Inc.


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