Obama's tax & spend budget

The following is from Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite's office:

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION HIDING OUTRAGEOUS TAXES & SPENDING IN NEW BUDGET

Weeks after President Obama released his outline for the federal budget for 2010, the House of Representatives is set to vote on the budget in a few days. If passed, this budget resolution serves as a framework from which Congress will work for the next five years. The White House and my Democratic colleagues in Congress claim this budget will reduce deficits and won’t increase taxes, but that is a mirage created by gimmicks. Obama’s budget dramatically increases the size and role of the federal government while failing to address the trillions of dollars in future spending our government already knows it will not be able to fund. There is only one way to pay for all this spending: higher taxes on you.

I have been hearing absolute infuriation from folks across the Fifth District over the irresponsible spending and the debt we will leave our next generations. “If the average person is expected to tighten their belt, why isn’t Washington? I am very worried,” I hear time and time again.

The President’s budget uses a number of gimmicks to give the appearance of a reduction in future deficits. For example, they use so-called “reserve funds,” which just gives Democratic budget leaders the ability to ask for additional funds later. Reserve funds are basically a commitment to tax and spend.

The House budget resolution contains seventeen such funds ranging from a further expansion of unemployment benefits to President Obama’s cap and tax initiative. The cap and tax proposal will tax anyone who uses electricity in the United States. President Obama’s economic advisors have admitted that just when they expect the economy to recover, President Obama plans on instituting a $1 trillion tax on all Americans who use electricity.

Even worse, buried in a footnote on page 127 the Obama budget calls for the largest increase in the death tax in U.S history beginning in 2010. Under his plan, estates will be taxed at an outrageous 45 percent. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the long-term impact of maintaining such a tax will result in $1.6 trillion less invested in small businesses and 1.5 million fewer jobs created. As the Wall Street Journal noted this week, “Obama won’t merely bring back from the dead one of the most despised of all federal taxes, and not merely splinter many family owned businesses. He will also forfeit half the jobs he hopes to gain from the $787 billion stimulus bill.”

A recent letter sent to me from a constituent in Hernando said, “It seems no one is listening to the people. We can’t spend our way out of this. I recognized this when I reviewed my own budget and bills. I no longer overextend myself.” Rest assured; I am listening.

An alternative plan is available and Republicans have tried to offer commonsense amendments to Obama’s budget, but unfortunately those were struck down in committee on party line votes. The budget resolution is a further example of the Democrats’ plans to increase taxes on every American and dramatically increase the size and scope of the federal government. Republicans have alternatives that rely on the strengths of the American people not the size of the federal government. For all of these reasons, I will oppose this budget when it comes for a vote on the House floor later this week.

Thank you,

Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite