[vbmoneyspender]

Reagan gave in time and again (higher taxes in 1986 . . .

What is your source for this contention. I did a google search on this and ended up at the Hoover Institute's web page and they wrote in there that "President Ronald Reagan’s Tax Reform Act of 1986 . . . reduced the top marginal rate of tax from 50 percent to 28 percent." Here is the link. Now maybe what you are saying is that Reagan made the tax code simpler by eliminating various tax deductions in return for lowering marginal rates. But is it really fair to call that a tax increase?

[LS]

Yes, it is fair. If you read his own bio, "An American Life," he ADMITS it was a net tax increase. THAT IS WHY THEY PASSED IT---because the Dems convinced him they needed more tax revenues, and he finally compromised.

[Texasforever]

What is your source for this contention

"Like Ronald Reagan, who managed to preside in relative secrecy over $90 billion in 'revenue enhancements' after the well-publicized 1981 tax cuts, Bush has some bipartisan support for his antitax posture."

-- Time magazine, December 4.

Historical Precedents

Remember the term "revenue enhancement?" OMB Director David Stockman and President Reagan used it to avoid having to talk about a tax increase. Everyone knew a tax hike was being proposed, but the phrase allowed the Reagan White House to say it was doing something different.