GOP: There They Go Again!
By: Lowell
Published On: 2/23/2005 2:00:00 AM
Wow, from the sound of the right-wing spin machine, you'd think that Tim Kaine is just itchin' to raise our taxes. Basically, what the Washington Times and others seem to be saying is this: "See, those darn liberals are at it again, sticking their hands in our pocketbooks for their nefarious schemes. Just like we told you they'd do. So vote for us, not them -- we're good and they are BAD!"
Yes, it's only February and you can already hear one of Jerry Kilgore's major attack lines on Tim Kaine heating up -- "he'll raise your taxes and I won't." Boy, that's original. I mean, seriously, haven't we heard this one about a zillion times before from Republicans? And isn't it fascinating that the Republicans are gearing up their attack machine on Lt. Governor Kaine for holding essentially the exact same position as the Virginia Chamber of Commerce?
The Chamber -- that's right, that crazed bunch of left wing commies -- is worth quoting on this issue, because it sounds amazingly close to the Kaine campaign's position on revenues:
The Virginia Chamber of Commerce believes Virginia has reached the point where additional revenue is needed to meet the state?s core obligations. Furthermore, Virginia must take seriously the threatened loss of its AAA bond rating from one of the major credit rating firms. A lowered credit rating would harm Virginia ?s economic prospects and would force the state to spend more on debt service and less on priority services. As an economist noted in a recent interview, losing it would probably be worse than never having had it to begin with. No one is enthusiastic about raising taxes, but we believe that the other choices are as bad or worse.
In other words, Tim Kaine is, on fiscal matters, the de facto candidate of the Virginia Chamber of Commerce. Jerry Kilgore, meanwhile, is the all-but-de jure candidate of the far-right-wing Virginia Club for Growth (an ioteresting name, by the way, given the "Club's" policies, if implemented, would seriously harm growth in Virginia by starving the state of essential roads and other services).
So, what prompted this latest outburst of Republican outrage about (supposed) Democratic raids on your pocketbook? Specifically, Republicans are referring to Tim Kaine's comments the other day that: a) he would continue the car tax phaseout; and b) he would not be "talking about new revenue" until we "lock up the transportation fund." Still, Kaine committed the right-wing Republican heresy (burn him at the stake!) of failing to take revenue increases off the table for all eternity. Unlike Jerry Kilgore, who would rather grandstand and irresponsibly pander to voters in an election year. Sadly, grandstanding and pandering appear to be specialties of Republican politicians here in Virginia.
In contrast, Lt. Governor Kaine is a proud member of the reality-based community, unlike the Flat Earth Society Republicans. Which is why Kaine knows that, in order to deal with the sorry state of our state's transportation system and our rapidly growing population, we might actually - horror of horrors - have to consider raising revenues to pay for new roads, trains, etc. What a concept!
Apparently, though, the Jerry Kilgore/Jim Gilmore Republicans would rather sit in traffic for hours on end, while harming the attractiveness of Virginia as a place for businesses to locate, simply in order to hold to their irresponsible "no taxes but spend like crazy anyway" philosophy. We here at RaisingKaine are curious, though, what ever happened to fiscal conservatism. We could have sworn that this used to mean balancing the budget and paying your bills, but apparently that quaint notion went out of style in the Republican Party a while back, leaving the Democrats as the only major party with a smidgeon of fiscal discipline left to them, apparently.
Why don't the right-wing Republicans just make their argument crystal clear: they want to slash taxes (to zero, if possible) simply because they hate paying one red cent to the Evil Government. And, they will do this even if it means destroying our state's hard-won fiscal integrity, our roads, our schools, our hospitals, our environment, and everything else in the process. Just NO MORE TAXES!! That's it. That's the Kilgore/Gilmore Republicans' entire plan for running Virginia. Impressive, ain't it?
By the way, haven't we seen this B-movie before, back in the 1980s when the Republicans racked up trilions of dollars in natinoal debt? Or, in 2001-2005, as the Bush Administration turned a large and growing budget surplus during the Clinton years into a large and growing deficit as far as the eye can see? And the Republicans are seen as the party of "fiscal conservatism" for what reason exaxctly?
Let's face it, the Democrats are the party of fiscal responsiblity. The Kilgore/Gilmore Republicans? Well, frankly, they don't give a damn. Instead, they'd rather bankrupt the state while they cynically laugh all the way to the bank -- not to mention the governor's mansion (or so they hope). That's because Kilgore/Gilmore Republicans are the "We've got ours so screw the rest of you" people. To paraphrase a famous Republican from the 1980s: "There they go again!"
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