Posted on 02/10/2007 9:26:03 PM PST by FairOpinion
Republican primary voters should rally around the GOP field's most accomplished supply-sider, the all-but-announced Rudolph W. Giuliani. Having sliced taxes and slashed Gotham's government, New York's former mayor is the leading fiscal conservative among 2008's GOP presidential contenders.
Before Giuliani's January 1, 1994 inauguration, New York's economy was on a stretcher. Amid soaring unemployment, 235 jobs vanished daily. Financier Felix Rohatyn complained: "Virtually all human activities are taxed to the hilt." Punitive taxes helped fuel a $2.3 billion deficit.
Mayor-elect Giuliani sounded Reaganesque when he announced he would "reduce the size and cost of city government" to balance the budget. In his first State of the City address, he said: "We're going to cut taxes to attract jobs so our people can work."
Giuliani spent eight years keeping these promises.
"America's Mayor" cut or killed 23 levies, saving taxpayers $9.8 billion. Giuliani pared Gotham's top income-tax rate by 20.6%. Washington, D.C.'s CFO reported that between 1993 and 2001, local taxes on a family of four New Yorkers earning $50,000 fell 23.7%.
Giuliani cut the commercial-rent tax, curbed sales taxes, and curtailed the marriage penalty on taxpaying couples. Giuliani proudly shaved Gotham's hotel tax from 6% to 5 in 1994. Consequently, that tax's revenues soared from $135 million in Fiscal Year 1995 to $239 million in FY 2001.
Giuliani defends his supply-side instincts with bracing candor. Asked after September 11 if he would hike taxes, Giuliani called that "a dumb, stupid, idiotic, and moronic thing to do."
Giuliani's expenditure growth averaged 2.9% annually, while local inflation between January 1994 and December 2001 averaged 3.6%. His FY 1995 budget decreased outlays by 1.6%, while his post-9/11 FY 2002 plan lowered appropriations by 2.6%.
If President Bush had followed Giuliani's example and limited Washington's spending to 2.9% average, annual growth, the just-unveiled FY 2008 federal budget would cost $2.275 trillion, not $2.9 trillion, saving taxpayers $625 billion, the Cato Institute's Stephen Slivinski estimates. Such Giulianian fiscal discipline would generate a $386 billion surplus, not an anticipated $239 billion deficit.
Giuliani repeatedly privatized municipal assets. Giuliani sold WNYC radio for $20 million, WNYC-TV for $207 million, and Gotham’s share of the U.N. Plaza Hotel for $85 million. Divesting the New York Coliseum excised an eyesore from Columbus Circle and added $345 million to city coffers. Giuliani also let the private Central Park Conservancy manage Manhattan's fabled urban forest.
These eight years of tax reduction and fiscal responsibility helped hammer unemployment from 10.4 percent in 1993 to 5.7 percent in 2001. Simultaneously, personal income advanced 53 percent.
It's hard to compare a two-term ex-mayor, a one-term governor, and a four-term U.S. senator. Nevertheless, Cato's 2006 gubernatorial report card gives former Massachusetts chief executive Mitt Romney a "C." While the top personal tax rate fell 6 percent on his watch, thanks to a referendum voters approved before he arrived, Romney's first budget raised $140 million by closing corporate-tax loopholes. It also featured some $501.5 million in increased fees, including higher marriage licenses (from $4 to $50), pricier gun permits ($25 to $100), a $100 biannual fee for volunteer firefighters (rescinded under pressure), and a $10, previously free, ID card that lets the blind ride Boston public-transit gratis.
Few in Congress expose outrageous federal boondoggles as fervently as does John McCain. However, he is an ambivalent tax fighter. According to Club for Growth research, McCain opposed President Clinton's 1993 tax increases and supported his 1997 capital gains tax cuts. He also voted to extend President Bush's 2003 tax cuts. For 2005, McCain earned a 78% National Taxpayers Union rating -- an "A."
Unfortunately, McCain opposed President Bush’s 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. McCain voted against repealing the Death Tax in 2002. Also, in 1998, McCain embraced former Sen. Tom Daschle's (D.-S.D.) motion to approve Big Tobacco's Master Settlement Agreement, including a $1.10-per-pack cigarette-tax increase.
"I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues," McCain conceded to Wall Street Journal editorialist Stephen Moore. "I still need to be educated."
Conservatives seeking a proven leader to lasso taxes and rein in runaway spending have a natural choice for President: Rudolph W. Giuliani.
Oh no, not you again.
If id known youd be here id been much better, or atleast thought out better what i meant to say:-)
I know enough to know that rudy wont make it.
he may be an alright guy. He will always have 9/11 and the great job he did for NY attached to him.
BUT that will not make him a good president or change the fact that he is a LIBERAL.
IF hillary and RUDY make it past the primarys they will have little to debate.
IF Rudy debates say the other candidates in the GOP it will be crystal clear to ALL that he is a liberal.
It will also show very little difference between he and hillary. Those are facts. Rudy admists this himself. Why are we arguing it?
Ill make sure to think out my posts much more carefully in the future:)
anyhoo, its late here. night:-)
And YOU didn't address this:
"But nobody can explain to me how THAT will further the conservative agenda -- all those fine judges Hillary will appoint and the Dem Congress will rubberstamp."
Well, why do you want Hillary to appoint judges for the next 8 years, when hald the Supreme Court is really old?
Politics 101! Rudy and Hillary do not debate each other in the primary. You obviously know nothing about campaigns but are posting here anyway. No one is avoiding a debate right now and there won't be debates until fall and then Hillary will debate on the Dem side and Rudy on the Republican side.
"Simon held a fundraiser for Rudy in fact the end of January!"
That RINO Simon! ;)
Really, what are you people going to be reduced to by summer? The fact that you're forced to use such dishonest rhetorical clubs this early does little except prove the incredible weakness of your position.
"Most of Clinton's policies are very similar to most of mine." - Rudy Giuliani
Yah i got it OKAY.
It didnt come out right, i post with out thinking sometimes.
no i dont know all there is about politics, i never claimed to be a frickin scholar. But that doesnt mean i dont know a LIBERAL when i see one.
thats all i need to know. i will vote hunter in the primaries. if that makes me a political idiot. so be it.
BTW nopardons already informed me i have no business posting.
Thanks for the tip anyway.
Simon's conservative credentials were never that well proven or tested. The fact that he's already sold out to a leftwinger like Giuliani throws great suspicion on every word he's previously said.
But even if he was sincere before, he's sold out now in any case. After all, Benedict Arnold was the biggest superstar in America for quite some time - the hero of Saratoga. That is, until he turned traitor. Now his name is mentioned with that of Judas.
I believe in the second amendment. However, like all of the freedoms granted in the amendments,they are not unlimited.
I grew up in NJ in the 90s. My father has worked in NYC for his entire childhood. From 1985-1995 he was held up at gunpoint and mugged. No this wasen't late at night and it wasen't in a bad area of the city. This was during the morning rush hour outside of his office which was at the World Trade Center. Then Giuliani became mayor and instituted tougher gun laws and got guns out of the hands of people who commit violent crimes and as we all know violent crime was cut by 2/3s. Yet, if you were a law abiding citizen with a clean record, you could get a gun.
I understand in the rural areas of the country gun laws seem nonsensical and I agree. Having tough gun laws in rural middle America is pointless.
That illustrates the local nature of the issue. Rudy understands that and that is his posistion. He knows places like NYC need tough laws whereas Kansas does not. Therefore, like a true conservative he believes that it is a state right.
Wow bad typo sorry its almost 3 AM
I meant to say my father worked in NYC for my entire childhood and still does to this day.
I also forgot to mention that he was mugged 5 times between 85 and 95.
The most dangerous places in America are where honest, lawabiding citizens have been disarmed. It ain't rocket science. It doesn't take a genius to realize that armed robbers don't obey gun laws anyway. I lived in Washington, DC, I know. It is illegal to have a gun, but somehow, I still heard nightly gunfire coming from Anacostia.
We'll make sure you get your agenda through come January 2009.
Political memories are long.
Yeah right.
No, you only imagine that you "know enough". The rest is your own wishful thinking.
He is hardly a "LIBERAL" and has proven that he is a capable leader, which is far more than any of the bottom tier and the people some FREEPERS throw out, as to whom they want to run. Tell me, WHAT does Tony Snow bring, that would make him a good president? Yet several people want him to run/be president; for example.
If Hillary and Rudy make it past the primaries, they will have MUCH to debate and disagree with each other on. Is it that you believe that Hillary and Rudy are in complete accord and agreement on cutting taxes, cutting government, getting as many people off welfare as possible ( it WAS Hillary who kept Bill from signing that Bill TWICE and when he did finally, on the third try, sign it, she threw things at him and yelled her lungs out!), the WOT, minority set asides, crime, expanding the WOT, HILLARY CARE, and on and on and on.
Have you ever watched the presidential debates? If so, can you remember what they are REALLY like and what questions get asked?
What do you mean "IF RUDY DEBATES THE OTHER CANDIDATES....." Are you suggesting that Rudy won't be at the primary debates?
What be apparent, from those debates, is that quite a lot of the GOP's bottom tier are 1)not appealing 2) terrible speakers 3) not strong on the WOT 4)protectionist 5) and worse.
You keep on posting your own day dreams/wishes, as "facts"; they aren't.
Good night...............
"oh no its you again" was NOT meant in a bad way-sorry, forgot to put a smiley face ^_^
Like I said Ill do my best to be more careful how i post. your picking the words If or whatever and jumping on my posts. perhaps i made a much better lurker.
anyways, goodnight again!
Lemmings over the cliff, FRiend.
Take care of yourself.
Why no one ever brings up Rudy's job in the justice dept under President Reagan's watch is a loud silence. Let's have some good discussion about how he was picked by the gipper as the 3rd guy below the attorney general...Or how about his tough stance on bringing down the mob in NY...or how he ousted the terrorist Yassar Arafat in 1995 and gave back a 19 Million dollar check to a Saudi Prince for blaming America for 9/11!
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