Secretary of the Treasury John Snow is will be stepping down from his position sometime over the next few days, he has told the White House. He plans to stay no later than July 3. Snow, a former railroad executive who a source says is excited to get back to the private sector, has been little more than a yes-man for this administration's policies. He has enthusiastically promoted extremely regressive business tax breaks and has done little to proactively fight what is turning into a cycle of continuing budget deficits. Director of Federal Fiscal Policy at OMB Watch Adam Hughes has stated:

Senate aides said yesterday that estate tax repeal will likely be the third order of business to come up when the Senate returns after the Memorial Day recess. The Senate will vote on full repeal, and after that likely fails, it is Senator Jon Kyl's (R-AZ) intention to bring his "reform" plan up for a vote. His plan is little better than full repeal as it would attain very little of the actual revenue garnered from the estate tax. Take action on this issue! Contact your Senators and tell them to vote no on repeal and no on Kyl's fiscally irresponsible alternative.

Today, President Bush signed the $70 billion Deficit Growth Package (aka Tax Relief Extension Reconciliation Act of 2005) into law. And as he places more debt on the shoulders of our children and grandchildren, he continues to mislead the American people by claiming that the 2003 tax cuts are the cause of the growing economy. One of the most important decisions we made was to cut the taxes on dividends and capital gains. These cuts were designed to lower the cost of capital and to encourage businesses to expand and hire new workers. And these tax cuts are doing exactly what we expected.

President Bush is slated to sign the $70 billion tax reconciliation bill tomorrow, and this provides as good an opportunity as any to disprove a myth that unfortunately has been floating around the anti-tax ranks for some time now: that tax cuts pay for themselves, or even come close to doing so.