For the week of  September 5 - 11, 2001

Surpluses? Pfffft!

---

Republicans have great sport bashing Democrats for what they characterize as "spend, spend, spend" policies.

Well, now, how do Republicans in Washington AND the Idaho capital city explain their predicament?

Robust surpluses of a year ago suddenly have vanished — pffft! — through tax cuts. Maybe that’s the Republican version of "spend, spend, spend."

The bad news gets worse. The outlook for replenishing government coffers through healthy economic growth is bleak: the economy nationally and in Idaho is in a nosedive, brought on by huge worker layoffs and drastic cutbacks in corporate spending.

Instead of heeding calls for prudence and caution, President George W. Bush had barely moved into the Oval Office before demanding Congress approve a $1.3 trillion tax cut that he glowingly predicted would put zip into the economic doldrums. No such thing has happened. And now his advisers concede they may need to turn to the Social Security surplus for budget help.

Ditto in Boise, as Republican legislators and Gov. Dirk Kempthorne hurried through a $100 million tax relief bill that virtually wiped out the state’s surplus.

Now, the federal surplus of hundreds of billions of dollars that Bush inherited from the Clinton years has turned into near-zero balance, and Idaho’s Gov. Kempthorne is scurrying around ordering cuts in government services after demanding a tax cut only a year earlier.

The possibility of amassing more healthy surpluses is a distant dream right now.

Idaho’s and the president’s abuse of surpluses share a common flaw: they were driven blindly by politics, not by sound economic vision or thoughtful leadership.

Bush and Gov. Kempthorne were adequately cautioned that the once-robust economy was showing signs of anemia, and surely would result in a slowdown in tax revenues that ultimately could mean cuts in government programs.

President Bush’s budget dilemma gives new meaning to the old saw, "Like father, like son."

Bush the Elder broke his vow — "read my lips: no new taxes" — and paid for it in 1992. Now Bush the Younger’s broken vow not to invade the Social Security surplus already is clouding his presidency less than a year into his term.

Maybe Republicans need the advice of the battle cry that helped Bill Clinton win the presidency.

"It’s the economy, stupid."

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.