Rep. Lincoln Davis: Truth About the Budget
From the Columbia Daily Herald: Back to Pay-As-You-Go: The truth about the budget by Rep. Lincoln Davis
There are many untruths emanating from Washington about the recently passed House budget. It almost seems like there is an attempt to rewrite history.
First, the D.C. Republicans have zero credibility when it comes to the budget. Last year, when they were in complete control, they couldn’t pass a budget resolution or the appropriations process. The wheels completely fell off. They gave us the rainforest in Iowa, the Bridge to Nowhere, and when handed a budget surplus in the hundreds of billions in 2000, it only took six years to squander it and saddle us with historic deficits and a ballooning debt.
The record needs to be set straight. The newly passed budget ends the “borrow and spend” era of the last several years with the reimplementation of Pay-As-You-Go rules. As a result of the reckless “borrow and spend” mentality taxpayers now spend $254.6 billion in interest payments to finance our debt. During this time, federal spending increased more than any other time since the Johnson Administration. So much for small government.
Furthermore, since 2001, foreign ownership of our Treasury securities more than doubled to $2.2 trillion (with Communist China being a major buyer of our debt). This is not rhetoric, but fact. Figures don’t lie. The Democratic budget achieves balance by 2012 and blocks the trend of “borrow and spend.”
Not only does the Democratic budget achieve balance by 2012, it also rejects the president’s deep cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. The budget also makes down payments on critical national priorities including health care for children, education, veterans’ programs, and the farm economy. The budget also accommodates deficit-neutral middle-income tax relief — including the Alternative Minimum Tax, the child tax credit, and the marriage penalty — while providing the necessary resources to meet critical national security threats to the nation.
Additionally, there is language in the budget stating support for the extension of the state sales tax deduction. The GOP budget has no such provision. You can be certain that my Tennessee colleagues and I, Democrats and Republicans, will be working hard to make sure the state sales tax deduction not only is extended but made permanent.
If the Republican Party was serious about longterm tax cuts for the middle class, they would have made them permanent when they were first passed instead of setting expiration dates.
The proof is in the facts. Like most farmers, Tennesseans won’t be sold a blue-eyed mule again by the GOP.
Lincoln Davis, D-Tennessee, represents the fourth district of the U.S. Congress.
