Tax And Spending

In responding to a recent column ("Question for tea party: What now?" Aug. 4), Stanley J. Glinka accuses Dan Rodricks of forgetting that the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress from 2007-2010, which he claims "was the time when our economy went downhill. " However, Mr. Glinka himself appears to forget that the Republicans previously controlled both Congress and the White House, and that during the Bush Administration tax cuts, an enormously costly Medicare prescription drug benefit, two expensive and unfunded wars and rising entitlement costs turned a $290 billion budget surplus in 2000 into a $455 billion deficit by 2008.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair told a Baltimore audience Tuesday night that the world's challenges have never been greater, nor come with such speed, and he advocated intervention in struggling countries by powers such as Great Britain and the United States. "I don't think there's been a more difficult time to be a political leader than now," Blair, who left office in 2007, told an audience of 2,800 at Loyola University Maryland. He described challenges posed by globalization and ever-evolving technology and said that "often the best short-term politics is in collision with the best long-term policy.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski is out of touch with the average Marylander. She has been a rubber stamp for Barack Obama's agenda every step of the way. She has voted for the bailouts, Obamacare and trillions in new spending. How does she expect us to ever pay off our national debt? We are depending on the Chinese Communists to finance our debt. We are beholden to our enemies. America is in a precarious situation because we have leaders who are either very ignorant or don't care. Our two ultra-liberal senators (Ms. Mikulski and Sen. Ben Cardin)

John F. Kennedy, in his Pulitizer-Prize-winning book, "Profiles in Courage," gave three reasons why it is so difficult for elected officials to be courageous. First, all politicians want to be liked. Second, politicians want to get reelected. And third, interest groups exert enormous pressure on legislators to get their way. Ignoring all these factors is often difficult for lawmakers.It certainly was in Annapolis over the past two weeks. A surprising number of legislators, especially from Baltimore County, caved in on all three counts and voted against a package of new taxes to keep state and local governments from running aground.

Little noticed during the publicity over gun control and efforts to repeal the death penalty is another significant spending increase proposed by Governor O'Malley. With no regard for the future impact on Maryland taxpayers since O'Malley will not be governor then, he has proposed another unjustifiably huge increase in the Maryland budget. The state budget has grown from $29.6 billion in 2008 to a proposed $37.2 billion in 2014 (up from $35.8 billion in 2013). These unbridled state spending increases continue while the nation's fragile economy continues to struggle and hard-working state residents must work even harder to make ends meet. Federal employees are entering their third year of a pay freeze with the prospect of furloughs and another 20 percent loss of pay this year. O'Malley, likely looking for support for a future national office run, is now proposing a 3 percent pay increase for state workers. How will this pay increase be funded?

MANY members of Congress finally seem willing to recognize something well understood by millions of unemployed workers and bankrupt business owners: The U.S. economy is stagnant, with no strong upturn in sight.Two million more Americans are out of work today than 18 months ago. Businesses are still shutting down and consumers are still staying away from the stores.Many lawmakers now understand that a package of tax and budget cuts is needed to lower the barriers to economic activity and growth.

For months now, House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell has adamantly maintained that citizens want lawmakers to solve the state's entire billion-dollar deficit problem by simply cutting back the size of government. No new taxes has been Mr. Mitchell's credo. And he has held firm to this position. The people want it that way, he says.But Mr. Mitchell, it turns out, is wrong. According to today's Sun Poll, Marylanders do not want endless cutting of jobs and government services that will hurt schools, police and fire operations, libraries and the social programs they have come to depend upon.

It won't be easy resolving the differences in the House and Senate versions of the General Assembly's budget plans. And there is little time to reach a compromise: The constitutional deadline is midnight Monday.Both chambers passed quarter-billion-dollar tax packages to fortify the general state treasury. The House had the good sense to create a new 6 percent tax bracket for the rich and to ask corporations to pay a bit more to help close the state's $1.2 billion budget gap. The Senate, meanwhile, took the sensible position that beer, wine and liquor taxes -- as well as cigarette taxes -- should be increased substantially.

Isn't it time for Maryland House Speaker R. Clayton Mitchell, D-Kent, and Sen. Laurence Levitan, D-Montgomery, to turn fists into handshakes and avoid the kind of showdown that can only lead to budget deadlock? Precious little time remains to shape a state tax and spending plan. The two men ought to be quietly negotiating -- not issuing ultimatums.If the two leaders were to stop posturing and start searching for common ground, Maryland's continuing budget crisis might end in a hurry. There is ample room for accommodating both sides in the proposals being bandied about, including the latest, slimmed-down tax offering now on the floor of the state Senate.

WASHINGTON -- Armed with steady public support for his economic package, President Clinton held his first meetings with Republican congressional leaders who appeared divided over how to respond to the plan.Nearly two weeks after making his economic package public, Mr. Clinton and Vice President Al Gore met yesterday with the Republican House and Senate leadership on Capitol Hill. GOP lawmakers described the discussions with the president as cordial and nonconfrontational.But the Republicans disagreed over how their party, in the minority in both houses, should deal with Mr. Clinton's efforts to drive his program of tax increases and spending cuts through Congress.