Punting for a New Plan
Punting for a New Plan What should Congress do with our impending budget surplus? My colleague Mark Neumann has done a great service by stimulating discussion about this important issue ("A Neumann...
...or what the nature of our future commitments will be...
...By whose estimate...
...The USSR no longer exists, and with the exception of religious or ethnic conflicts, there is no suggestion of a threat of aggression between European countries...
...His push for votes has turned into a stealth missile that has reached its first target: three more countries in NATO, with more to come...
...The damage will have been done...
...How else to interpret their three-year vacillation in Bosnia prior to the U.S...
...That need is now defunct...
...We shall have to pray that the conference committee will kill the amendment...
...I believe it's a plan to equip the U.N...
...But Barnes fails to report that boosting the number of people labeled "rich" by this standard has virtually no effect on the question of what percent of the GOP's tax cuts goes to what percent of taxpayers...
...That being the case, would it not make sense to have a wide-ranging debate on the need for NATO in its present form...
...Our president wants the American people to pay billions to provide ultra-modern weapons of mass destruction to the three new kids on the block...
...There is legitimate concern that our leadership is failing deliberately to promote long-standing Republican principles...
...I believe my assessment was fair...
...The president has failed miserably to bring the American people into a discussion about the nature of our present and future commitments...
...Matthew Miller Pacific Palisades, CA In quoting Sen...
...To be sure, our national interest consists in maintaining security throughout the world, including Europe and the Middle East...
...And this job is made easier by tax cuts and reforms that return any budget surplus to the American people, spur economic growth, and keep the pressure on for further reductions in our overgrown federal bureaucracy...
...Sen...
...Richard Derham Seattle, WA...
...The corporate heads will, of course, surround themselves with a phalanx of lawyers equipped to protect them from the justified wrath of the American people, who are busy buying the goodies of a robust economy while their elite betters sell them out to the enemy...
...Is there any good reason for our continued membership in an organization formed to protect Europe from Soviet aggression...
...Those who voted for MFN status for China not only betrayed the Christians, the dissidents, and the Tibetan monks rotting and dying in prison, they have betrayed, without shame, U.S...
...with the capability to tyrannize sovereign nations that fall from its favor...
...I suggest that our NATO contribution would be better spent on improving our own military technology and in strengthening the capabilities of our armed forces...
...Of course it is not...
...Coverdell then complained, "The president has a huge ability to move a piece of information in 24 hours...
...My reporting found that these poor taxpaying families with full-time workers were left out to make room for breaks that benefit upper-income Americans...
...At Green's level of income, it is reasonable to assume that he is in the 40 percent marginal tax rate—meaning that he retains only 60 percent of his bonus...
...Tom Carroll New Market, VA The editors say that the monetary price of incorporating new NATO members is expected to be less than a billion dollars a year...
...Are they perhaps motivated by self-interest as opposed to altruism...
...I think Barnes actually administered a subtle test to see if anyone was paying attention to the real problem...
...Normally, someone seeking reimbursement of an after-tax expense (like a campaign contribution) with pre-tax dollars (such as a bonus) will want to have the tax impact reimbursed as well, so that he nets out even...
...Cover-dell's excuses as absolutely, unaccept-ably ludicrous...
...Coincidence, perhaps...
...In fact, if we were to continue to run a balanced budget and devote the entire surplus to tax cuts, the size of the debt would decline from almost half of GDP this year to just 30 percent of GDP in 2007...
...Paul Coverdell, Fred Barnes perhaps inadvertently identifies the culprits for the Republican fix...
...Sen...
...All three countries should take note that NATO is a military alliance, not an economic assistance plan...
...Republicans outside the Beltway can only wonder: Do our entrenched public officials really think that we in the hinterland cannot recognize Sen...
...Spencer Abraham Washington, DC Culprits in Distortion Fred Barnes says I reached the "astounding conclusion" that White House claims about who gains from Republican tax cuts are less distorted than the GOP's ("Every Man a King," July 21...
...Either way, neither you nor the president has yet described a vision of how this will be carried out...
...Like Judas, they will forswear their evil deed...
...Considering that the European Union is a monolithic industrial and financial powerhouse that dwarfs the United States in population and GDP, there is no reason they should not expand and finance their own defense system and assume responsibility for their own future skirmishes...
...Shouldn't we give more thought to changing formally its mission and its structure...
...Later you ask whether "a few hundred million dollars is too high a price for peace in Europe...
...I discovered with much surprise that The Weekly Standard was in fact promoting, with little cogency, NATO's enlargement...
...Most of us in the hinterlands realized long ago that the press loves it...
...Coverdell acknowledged that the Republicans are once again "slow in developing" a press-oriented response to President Clinton's instantaneous demagoguing of any Republican-proposed legislation...
...Don't the huge resources of the RNC belie the claim that we cannot match the president's ability to move information...
...Yet it will be too late to return the 30 pieces of silver...
...Surely not China, the nation that helped pay to reelect Clinton...
...And if the economy grew just 2 percent faster than currently thought (not overly optimistic given tax cuts' proven growth effects), the debt would fall to 25 percent of GDP in 2007 —half the relative size of today...
...Bill Clinton and the Democrats have been demonizing Republicans for six years now...
...Now we know who will be guilty of treason when—not if—American blood is shed to protect Taiwan or any Chinese neighbor China might seek to expropriate, as it did Tibet...
...Myron McFarland Monterey, CA Hawking the Goodies Thank you for informing your readers about what many of us have been saying for years: High performance computers are being sold to China, and we know they have already diverted them to military use ("The Oracle of Kemp," July 21...
...vital interests...
...Yet President Clinton has invited three other nations to join NATO...
...My colleague Mark Neumann has done a great service by stimulating discussion about this important issue ("A Neumann with a New Plan," July 21...
...Moreover, I agree with Rep...
...Is NATO's enlargement really in our national interest...
...Barnes points out, as I did, that the administration's weird definition of "income" dramatically overstates the number of Americans who earn more than $100,000...
...Neumann that we need to pay off our national debt...
...Peter J. Riga Houston, TX Entangling Coincidences In "Ernest Green's Bonus" (July 21), Byron York discusses the timing of Ernest Green's $50,000 contribution to the Democratic National Committee and the subsequent bonus—which may constitute an illegal reimbursement of a political contribution—from his employer...
...But in my view we should pay off that debt not by devoting the bulk of budget surpluses to debt payments, but rather by cutting taxes, thereby helping our economy grow while keeping up the pressure to reduce the size and scope of government...
...Why is it presumed that Europe cannot handle any purely European conflict...
...The editorial makes it clear that Russia is no longer a threat in the near term...
...Specter said the bonus was $54,000, while Green's lawyer asserted that it was $90,000...
...Tax cuts will not prevent us from paying down our debt in a timely manner...
...You need to give us more of your thoughts so that the country can better answer such questions, and better evaluate the merits of your position...
...Will the United States someday be on their hit list...
...Barnes also omits any discussion of the GOP's child tax credit, which departs from the original Contract With America proposal in denying the credit to millions of families that pay payroll taxes, but not income taxes, after counting their rebate from the earned income tax credit...
...The decision was made once the overall size of the tax cut became too small to accommodate both...
...Who are they preparing to fight...
...It is no longer credible for Republican leaders to affect mock surprise at the manner in which their "truths" are ignored by the press, while the president, as your article put it, "has a huge ability to move information...
...But at present we should concentrate our resources on Asia first and foremost...
...Sixty percent of $90,000 is $54,000...
...This is devastating to those of us who truly believed in the Contract With America, and who worked for the hard-won and long-sought goal of a Republican majority in Congress...
...led cease-fire...
...Is it because they appear unable to reach consensus...
...We have no comparable ability...
...If, like the EU, NATO became a purely European entity, Europe would become a virtually sovereign continent with an integrated defense and economy...
...What we increasingly cannot accept is why Republicans are still mystified as to how to handle such tactics...
...or why and how it will be done on the cheap...
...In this regard, and contrary to Barnes's assertion, it is not "purely speculative" to conclude that breaks on capital gains, estate taxes, and IRAs will disproportionately benefit upper income taxpayers when fully phased-in after five years...
...He also notes that Sen...
...York does not disentangle the discrepancy...
...Rather than lock in current, record-high levels of taxing and spending, in my view we should work to shrink the size of government by closing unneeded agencies and reforming entitlements...
...If they do not, people like Jack Kemp, Oracle corporate heads, IBM chairman Louis Gerstner, as well as those senators who voted for the amendment, should be charged with high treason when—again—the first drop of American blood is spilled by high-tech Chinese weaponry...
...Paul S. McCaig Dana Point, CA NATO was formed to protect Western Europe from the USSR...
...Converting the military forces of three countries to NATO standards is a large and expensive task...
...ANN C. Wollan Wilmette, IL a NATO Pasquinade Judging from the title of your editorial ("NATO: The More the Merrier," July 21), I was certain it was a subtle pasquinade serving to reinforce the logic of opposing the enlargement of NATO...
Vol. 2 • August 1997 • No. 46
