Billing The Grandkids: "George Washington would have been appalled."

[DeepModem Mom]

WP: Billing The Grandkids
By Ruth Marcus
Wednesday, June 11, 2008; Page A19

By the time Congress finishes the latest "emergency" war spending bill, a mere seven years into the emergency, the cost of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan will have exceeded $860 billion. For the first time in American history, every penny of that amount will have been borrowed. For the first time, billions more will have been borrowed to finance tax cuts in the midst of war.

Confronting the debt amassed during the Revolutionary War, George Washington was determined to pay it off, warning against "ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear." Confronting the enormous costs about to be piled up in Iraq, George Bush determined to press for new tax cuts -- not just "little bitty tax relief," as he put it, but hundreds of billions more.

"This contrast -- between an active war effort on one hand and substantial tax cuts on the other -- has no precedent in American history," three tax historians explain in "War and Taxes," a new book from the Urban Institute. Rather, since the War of 1812, "special taxes have supported every major military conflict in our nation's history."

As Steven Bank, Kirk Stark and Joseph Thorndike show, presidents and lawmakers have not always been eager to impose taxes to pay war costs. But historically, Republicans and Democrats alike ultimately acknowledged the necessity -- fiscal and moral -- of shared sacrifice. "I think the boys in Korea would appreciate it more if we in this country were to pay our own way instead of leaving it for them to pay when they get back," said House Speaker Sam Rayburn.

Until Iraq, that is. "Nothing is more important in the face of a war than cutting taxes," then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay declared in March 2003....

I'd argue that the biggest factor is the transformation of the Republican Party: This is the first extended war fought under the banner of supply-side economics. Richard Nixon, shortly after taking office, announced that "the path of responsibility" required him to support extending Lyndon Johnson's tax surcharge. That stance seems unimaginable for a Republican president today. Take John McCain, who refused to back additional tax cuts in 2003 because, he explained, "throughout our history, wartime has been a time of sacrifice." Now, as his party's presumptive nominee, McCain offers a costly menu of new tax cuts that makes Bush look like Ross Perot.

From the Democrats' perspective then, why take the political risk of pushing tax hikes to finance a Republican war?...

***

Here's the new, bipartisan fiscal policy: Soak the grandchildren. George Washington would have been appalled.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/10/AR2008061002531.html?nav=most_emailed

[liberal N proud]

1. George Washington would have called for a revolution

[DeepModem Mom]

2. You could be exactly right! nt

[Virginia Dare]

3. Jefferson, Madison and Mason would have called for the Revolution..

G.W. would have led it.