Strategery.
When the federal budget needs to be fixed ( and I am not convinced it does need to be fixed) you either cut spending or raise taxes. My guess is that politicians will cut spending before raising taxes. So Bush has made a bet. A bet that the country will not be in a tax raising mood anytime soon.
The last time the federal budget was cut year on year was 1965.
We avoided President Al Gore by statistical noise and President John Kerry by less than 1.5% of the vote. If Bush thinks tax hikers can't win elections, he's even stupider than the Dims claim he is.
What he is really betting on is that the majority of voters are too stupid to comprehend deficit spending, and that pork today will bring more votes than responsible planning for tomorrow. That's a sure bet. When the bill comes due, that will be another politician's problem.
My point is that whether you raise taxes or not, the real tax rate is measured by the rate of spending - we are paying for it either now or later.