Blog: The Fine Print / Open, Accountable Government

Update: Monday Mark-Up for $1 B Rangel Tax Bill

Feb 7, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

This just in, per today's CongressDaily ($): House Ways and Means Chairman Rangel said this afternoon he would move to break the House-Senate stalemate over minimum wage legislation by marking up a small business tax bill next Monday [which] he expects it to be "in the vicinity of $1 billion." It will also include about $1 billion in offsets to make it revenue neutral. Rangel insisted for weeks on passage of a "clean" minimum wage bill -- one containing no tax breaks. Today, Rangel insisted that he will not let his arm be twisted in conference negotiations over the size of the tax package.

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More Wishful Thinking in the President's FY 08 Budget

Feb 7, 2007 by Dana Chasin

We have showcased a number of omissions, deceptions, and exaggerations this week within the president's FY 08 budget proposal, but another fine point was uncovered this week as well that missed our notice. It concerns assumptions for how much revenues will grow over the next five years.

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Ruth Marcus: Bush To Raise Taxes So He Can Claim He Won't Raise Taxes

Feb 7, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

In the Washington Post today, Ruth Marcus recognizes that Bush is relying on a tax increase via the AMT to claim that he can balance the budget without raising taxes. Looked at another way, what the Bush tax cuts give to taxpayers, the AMT grabs back. By 2012, if it isn't changed, the AMT would take back almost one-third of the Bush tax cuts...it would take back more than half of the tax cut for people making between $100,000 and $200,000.

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Jump-Starting or Short-Circuiting Entitlement Debate?

Feb 6, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

An article in today's Wall Street Journal, On Deficit Cutting, Skeptics Abound remarks that the President's FY 2008 budget projections "still don't account for several big potential budget-busters, as budget analysts and Democratic critics were quick to note yesterday," making the point unflinchingly in this graph: Inexplicably, however, the article closes with what appears to be a stray talking point from an administration official (perhaps dated January, 2005?):

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Deficit Fix-ation: AMT = Allowing More Taxation?

Feb 6, 2007 by Dana Chasin

President Bush's FY 2008 budget proposal provides numerous projections calculated to prove the plausibility of his overall goal of eliminating the deficit budget by 2012 -- the only problem being the implausibility of the projections themselves. We have highlighted in our commentary on the budget and elsewhere some of the more conspicuously convenient calculations regarding war spending and AMT reform. CBPP expands upon the latter point in a paper released today, and relates it to a more plausibile assumption -- the extension of Bush's 2001 and 2003 tax cuts -- arguing that

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LA Times: Budget Doesn't Account for Troop Increase

Feb 6, 2007 by Matt Lewis

LA Times reports that the President left out another key expenditure: the cost of the troop increase in Iraq. The Bush administration's $142-billion war budget for next year leaves out money for the planned troop buildup in Iraq, a strong indication that the Pentagon views the increase as a short-term tactic to stem the escalating violence in Baghdad.

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Recommended Budget Analyses

Feb 6, 2007 by Adam Hughes*

Check out these breakdowns of the President's budget:
  • Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
  • Center for American Progress
  • National Priorities Project
  • Coalition on Human Needs

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OMB Watch Release Preliminary Budget Analysis

Feb 5, 2007 by Matt Lewis

OMB Watch has released a preliminary analysis of the President's FY 08 Budget request. President's Budget Full of Cheap Rhetoric; Wrong Priorities President Favors Tax Cuts for the Wealthy over Domestic Needs Check back here for additional analyses and commentary on the budget as the week progresses.

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President's Budget Takes Aim at Nation's Health

Feb 5, 2007 by Craig Jennings

President Bush's 2008 budget, to be released this morning, proposes to eliminate the deficit by 2012 with many spending cuts in various national health and well-being programs.
  • $101.5 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over five years
  • $223 million reduction in spending on the Children's Health Insurance Program, with cuts deep enough over five years to eliminate coverage for half of the children enrolled today
  • $99 million savings by eliminating a childhood obesity prevention program

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If CBO Can Do It, So Can - and Should - OMB Do It

Feb 2, 2007 by Craig Jennings

Based on the president's recent announcement of his plan to deploy an additional 21,000 troops to Iraq, CBO has released a report detailing the projected costs of such an escalation. CBO Director, Peter Orszag, predicts that the president's plan to increase troop levels could cost as much as $27 billion.

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