http://www.msnbc.com/news/920140.asp?0cv=KB20&cp1=1
Fiction and the Tax Cut
Bush gets his gimmicky tax cut while a $400 child credit for millions of
low-wage families is eliminated. Are his critics suffering from outrage
exhaustion?
NEWSWEEK WEB EXCLUSIVE
May 30 � Under the glittering chandeliers of the East Room of the
White House, President Bush signed into law the most wealth-oriented tax
bill in history.
It was one of those nuggets that exposes the truth. Bush�s tax cut
was never about economic stimulus, or the rebate would have been directed
toward the people who will spend it, not the rich who just get richer.
Senate and House conferees brushed away the crumbs slated for those
making barely more than minimum wage in order to maintain the fiction
that the bill comes in under the Senate�s $350 billion cap. In a bill
already loaded with gimmicks, couldn�t they have found one more phony
accounting device to preserve the one tax break that makes economic and
social sense?
When I put that question to a Republican staffer, he said there
was no one in the room who cared, not the principals, not the staff, and
they didn�t need Democrat Blanche Lincoln�s vote anymore. She was the
lawmaker who pressed the Senate to expand the child credit to include
more low-income parents. Almost half the taxpayers in Lincoln�s home
state of Arkansas report taxable incomes of less than $20,000. Under the
bill�s formula, families earning between $10,500 and $26,625 will not
benefit. The GOP staffer went on to say he didn�t know whether his party
was moved more by hubris or money, but he did know the people who just
got screwed weren�t at the president�s dinner last week when Bush raised
$22 million for Republican campaigns.
Bush�s critics inside and outside his party are suffering from outrage
exhaustion. How much can Bush get away with before the public and the
media hold him accountable? If this shameful provision is not repealed,
11.9 million children, or one of every six children under 17 ,will be
shortchanged according to The Center on Budget and Priorities, an
admittedly liberal group, but whose facts are not disputed. Keep an eye
on the media and whether the networks pick up the story, first reported
in Thursday�s New York Times. If the Times story resonates, Karl Rove and
his tag team of compassionate conservatives will do damage control,
pledging perhaps to correct the omission with another tax bill in the
fall, which they will see as an opportunity to push through still more
cuts for upper-income voters.
Republicans on Capitol Hill are upset about the administration�s
arrogance. They�re tired of getting the brush-off when they ask what
happened to the weapons of mass destruction allegedly in Iraq and where�s
the administration�s plan for the war�s aftermath? Negative sentiment is
growing as Congress comes to grips with the length of time (years, not
months) and money (billions) and manpower (hundreds of thousands) it will
take to rebuild Iraq. Just as Bush dissembled on the cost of the war,
refusing to put a price tag on it until the bombs were falling, he hasn�t
come clean with Congress or the American people about the war�s
aftermath, or how it will squeeze domestic programs.
The economic rationale for this tax cut is dubious, but its
political impact is clear. It�s a cynical device to re-elect the
president and put the country in hock. One Senate Republican dubs it �The
Rangers Relief Act,� after the newly created category of Bush donors who
contribute at least $200,000 to his re-election. (The Pioneers used to be
the high-rollers at $100,000 plus; now the Rangers, named after the
baseball team Bush owned, are the heavy hitters.) �The tax cut reimburses
the donors before they�ve given,� says the Senate Republican, noting the
added benefit of starving the government of resources to support the
programs that Democrats typically champion, like Social Security and
Medicare.
More than 2 million jobs have been lost since Bush became president, yet
it feels in Washington as if we�re living in a second Gilded Age. Worries
about income inequality or imbalance are treated like quaint notions from
another era. A report touts a new casino opening in Atlantic City that
will feature thousand-dollar coins for slot machines. The clientele it
hopes to attract won�t be spending the milk money. Richer Americans send
their children to private schools, so who cares if Bush�s much heralded
�No Child Left Behind� education bill is woefully underfunded. There is
no counterbalance to the corporate priorities of the Bush administration
and the shifting of the tax burden to lower-earning Americans in order to
free up the capital of the rich. Still, it is a gamble for Bush. If the
economy doesn�t recover sufficiently, can he blame it on the Democrats
for not giving him everything he wanted?
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