CLT Update
Saturday, February 2, 2002
Damn, we're right again
Any fool can raise taxes. What is needed is an intelligent, mature discussion of spending cuts
- and the sooner, the better.
A Boston Herald editorial
Feb. 2, 2002
Tax hike bandwagon gets ready to roll
A CLT BLAST FROM THE PAST
- 1998 -
Charging that lawmakers were spending wildly to
avoid further tax cuts, Citizens for Limited Taxation and Government's Barbara Anderson
predicted: "Government will get bigger and bigger and there will be another fiscal crisis and
another tax increase."
The Boston Herald
Jul. 21, 1998
Money's no object as pols OK $19.6B budget
(available on our website)
In July the state parole board unanimously called for the release of Gerry Amirault, yet he is still in prison.
This injustice is one of the biggest issues on Barbara's mind and has been for some time: that taxpayers
continue to pay for the incarceration of this innocent man.
So we ask that you help free him with a message to Governor Swift. The contact information is below.
Today the Boston Herald has highlighted the proposed tax hikes in its editorial, "Tax hike bandwagon
ready to roll."
We are not surprised that the "tax bandwagon" is in motion. We predicted it would roll all along, as far
back (thanks to our website, where I did my research) as 1997. We have on our
bookshelf volumes of news-clipping books from as far back as the early-80s. (Good luck to our opposition; the facts are the
facts remember the "temporary" quotes?)
 |
|
Chip Ford |
GERRY AMIRAULT
Write, fax, e-mail, phone Governor Swift
by Barbara Anderson
We have heard from a few CLT members who think we should not
be involved in this issue. Many others have let us know that they are very glad we are speaking out about an injustice
that bothers them too. Though we have reverted to our shorter name because it fits into
newspaper stories, we are still formally Citizens for Limited Taxation and Government; a
result of the merger with CLT and Chip Ford's "Freedom First" back in 1996.
We do primarily tax issues, but are involved in legislative
reform and will also be counting the primary seatbelt law vote in our rating because it involved fees and another
broken government promise. When our tax dollars are used to perpetuate a terrible injustice like the
Amirault witch trial, we can choose to be involved.
We expect that not all CLT activists will agree with us on
everything, since you are all individuals, but if you do agree on this, please contact Governor Swift's office as soon as
possible. Here is the memo from our Amirault coordinator:
Dear Friend of Justice,
We must all let our voices be heard again. We must
recontact Governor Swift and urge her to do the right thing -- Commute Gerald Amirault's sentence without
insulting restrictions and without depriving him of his First Amendment rights.
Gerald Amirault is a fine and innocent man. He deserves
his freedom. And the American public deserves to know the story of this horrible miscarriage of justice.
The contact information for Governor Swift is:
The Honorable Jane Swift, Governor
Executive Office of the Governor
Massachusetts State House
Boston MA 02133
Phone: (617) 727-3600
Fax: (617) 727-9725
E-mail: Goffice@state.ma.us
Blasts from the past
Who was right on the money?
We recently warned that if we don't take back all those tax
increases imposed to solve the Dukakis "fiscal crises" of the late-'80s, now that the debt is about to be paid off in full,
[the Legislature would] find new ways to spend it. They have, and they will continue to find new
"unmet needs" until it's gone and they have to come back and hit us up for more.
Remember, when they ran the state into fiscal meltdown, how
quick they were with not one, but two income tax increases, first from 5 percent to a "temporary" 5.75 percent, followed
by another income tax hike to 6.25 percent...
CLT Update: May 20, 1997
We've often criticized the Legislature's budget-makers for
trying to hang on to extra revenue instead of giving it back to the taxpayers. The situation is worse than we thought. They
literally can't spend it fast enough....
Our budget-makers seem to be slipping back into the habits
of their predecessors of the 1980s, giving every claimant something, unable to set reasonable limits. Sure, every program
is deserving. But modern politics is the eternal quest for more, and once started, social
programs are immortal.
When inflation is running at less than 2 percent (after
accounting tor the overstatement of official statistics), what is the state doing spending 6 percent more? Its economy is not
growing that fast. Why is the state allotting 8 percent more to higher education? And 8.7
percent more to the courts?
This lack of fiscal discipline is paving the way for
trouble.
A Boston Herald editorial
Jul. 2, 1997
Undisciplined budget
"If we wait, they'll take the money they have been spending
on the deficit bonds and earmark it for handicapped puppies so we'll never be able to get it," she said. "Right now, we don't
have to cut anything."
The Boston Globe
Jul. 7, 1997
CLT returns to center stage in fight for income-tax cut
Charging that lawmakers were spending wildly to avoid
further tax cuts, Citizens for Limited Taxation and Government's Barbara Anderson predicted: "Government will get
bigger and bigger and there will be another fiscal crisis and another tax increase."
The Boston Herald
Jul. 21, 1998
Money's no object as pols OK $19.6B budget
Anti-tax activist Barbara Anderson criticized the growth in
the budget.
"If they want to do fiscal restraint, they should simply do
fiscal restraint and come in with a budget that does not exceed inflation," she said.
Anderson, however, lauded the tax cut proposal, saying,
"There is no way to restrain government spending unless you take the money away."
Associated Press
Jan. 27, 1999
Birmingham calls Cellucci's budget plan "sleight of hand"
But keep a promise on Beacon Hill? -- keep their word and
roll back the income tax rate to where it was before the fiscal crisis they created? -- make "temporary" again mean
temporary instead of "until we sucker you next time"?
CLT Update: Feb. 2, 1999
"A surplus is always a great plus. When they come to
conference committee with certain figures, that allows us to spend a little more money. Any surplus we have, you know we'll
spend, because there are so many programs that need funding."
State Rep. John P. Fresolo (D-Worcester)
The Telegram & Gazette
Jul. 3, 2000
State's surplus surges $200M; Extra cash to fuel spending debate
The Boston Herald
Saturday, February 2, 2002
A Boston Herald editorial
Tax hike bandwagon gets ready to roll
The state economic news is grim and getting grimmer.
The state collected $185 million less in tax revenue in
January than it had anticipated. Even before that gloomy bit of news, state spending was already $189 million more than we
could afford. Early retirements by state workers were supposed to help ease that situation, but they
simply aren't happening at the rate officials thought they would. (Not everyone wants
to take the money and run in a recessionary economy.) So thus far, all of this adds up to a $374
million gap that will have to be covered. And that's for the current fiscal year.
And if the state can somehow muddle through this year, well,
the next fiscal year, which begins July 1, isn't looking like a piece of cake either.
Now there are some responsible adults on Beacon Hill who
will look at the numbers - specially for next year - and think, "Aha, we're spending more than we're taking in. That
means we have to cut spending."
Sad to say, those folks are few and far between. This is
Massachusetts, after all, and the impulse of the state's liberal Democratic wing is never to cut. No, that would be
wrong. That would aggrieve some constituency group.
So when Democratic House members caucused on Thursday, the
agreement they reached was to regroup come late April to discuss - bet you can't imagine what comes next - tax
hikes.
Some people will never learn. That's right. Take a tough
economy and blast it back to the stone age by halting the next phase of the income tax rollback or upping the capital gains
tax (on heaven knows what capital gains) or - and this is a really swell idea - repealing the tax
break for charitable giving (at a time when charities are already hurting).
"We're heading in a downward spiral very quickly, economically and fiscally, and we need to
be honest with ourselves and with the people of the commonwealth in order to
begin to address solutions," said House Ways and Means Chairman John Rogers (D-Norwood). So
far, so good. Then, he added, the House set April 29 "to have an intelligent, mature
discussion about tax hikes or tax cut postponements."
Any fool can raise taxes. What is needed is an intelligent,
mature discussion of spending cuts - and the sooner, the better.
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