The Hindu : Bush shifts focus to domestic issues

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 30, 2003

International

International

Bush shifts focus to domestic issues

By Sridhar Krishnaswami

Washington APRIL 29. After seven weeks of foreign policy devoted to matters pertaining to Iraq, the White House is slowly shifting gear and some of this has to do with the twin realisation that there is a perception out there that this administration is not fully devoting itself to domestic issues; and that the 2004 presidential election will have a strong domestic economic component. If Iraq was a subject of the weekly radio address of the President, George W. Bush, every week since February, he did something different last weekend. He took the opportunity to take on lawmakers, even within his own party, who are opposed and are resisting tax cuts.

"Since they already agree that tax relief creates jobs, it doesn't make sense to provide tax relief and therefore create fewer jobs'', Mr. Bush said in his weekly radio address. "I believe we should enact more tax relief so that we can create more jobs and more Americans can find work and provide for their families'', the President remarked.

Senior members of the Senate, top Republicans included, are resisting the White House's call for a $550-billion cut in taxes, this figure itself scaled down from the original demand of $726 billions. Lawmakers believe that tax cuts should not exceed $350 billions. All tax cuts that are currently debated are over a 10-year period.

What has particularly irritated the White House is that Republican Senators have been quite vocal against tax cuts; and if at all anything is to materialise it should be in the range of $350 billions. In fact, it was the political reality on Capitol Hill that forced the White House to accept the reduced amount to begin with. Members in the House of Representatives have capped the tax relief at $550 billions and the Senate has said it should be no more than $350 billions. Mr. Bush took his fight on tax cuts last week to Ohio and to the turf of the Republican Senator, George Voinovich, who is one of the two lawmakers calling for a package less than $350 billions.

Many on Capitol Hill believe that the American public is against any huge tax breaks, but the White House believes the opposite to be the case and argues that reluctant and defiant lawmakers are out of touch with the ground reality. But Democrats on Capitol Hill and elsewhere have been keeping the pressure on the White House, arguing among other things, that tax cuts are not going to help either the economy or the ordinary folk but only the rich.

"They can dress up this tax cut any way they want, and it's still just that — a tax cut for the wealthiest one percent of Americans that does nothing to create jobs and will only sink our nation into further debt'', argued the Ohio lawmaker, Stephanie Tubbs Jones.

The focus on the domestic agenda does not mean that Iraq is off the radar screen. On Monday, the President is planning to travel to Dearborn, Michigan, to talk about Iraq's future; and on Thursday, he will be spending the night on an aircraft carrier returning home after seeing action in the Persian Gulf. The President may formally announce during this trip that the military phase of the conflict in Iraq is over.

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