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03/07/2005: "Tax Cuts Lose Spot On GOP Agenda"

Blogger note: I don't get it... aren't tax cuts supposed to INCREASE government revenue by stimulating the economy?? Therefore, why in hell would W want to RAISE TAXES. If anyone has the answer, please respond. Sincerely, A very confused W booster. (I'm sincerely baffled... as we need MORE TAX cuts NOT LESS : W has said this all along..)

Tax Cuts Lose Spot On GOP Agenda
Mon Mar 7, 7:43 AM ET Politics - washingtonpost.com


By Jim VandeHei, Washington Post Staff Writer

President Bush (news - web sites) and Republican lawmakers are being forced to temper their anti-tax ambitions, as the party that consolidated power in Washington by promising to shrink government grapples with the high cost of its efforts to expand the Defense Department and the nation's two largest entitlement programs.

The president's only new tax initiative for the second term -- a broad restructuring of the tax code -- will be crafted in a way that results in a simpler system, not lower taxes, White House aides said.


At the same time, Bush's call for Congress to make permanent all the tax cuts enacted in his first term faces increasingly strong resistance among some Republicans concerned about rising deficits. The chairmen of the Senate Budget and Finance committees said in interviews last week that Republicans might wait until next year, or later, to consider the Bush plan, because the cuts do not expire until the end of the decade.


And, for the first time in years, Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) and other Senate Republicans are advocating increasing taxes -- as a way to pay for a restructuring of Social Security (news - web sites). Bush has not ruled out backing the effort.


"What is different this year is deficits loom larger over the debate in the Senate," said Graham, who opposes extending some of the Bush tax cuts he supported. "I believe senators will be more balanced in what we can afford."


Federal Reserve (news - web sites) Board Chairman Alan Greenspan (news - web sites) warned Congress last week that rising deficits beg new scrutiny of tax cuts. "Addressing the government's own imbalances will require scrutiny of both spending and taxes," he said.