Saturday, March 20, 1999
Lucas raps both parties on budget
You're no conservative, local GOP says
BY PATRICK CROWLEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Neither political party in Congress is offering a fiscally sound plan on cutting taxes and saving Social Security, U.S. Rep. Ken Lucas said Friday.
Mr. Lucas said he is working with the Blue Dog Coalition, a group of self-described moderate House Democrats, to develop alternative budget plans to what Republicans as well as Democrats are offering.
“Neither the Republican nor Democratic alternatives as they stand seek to extend the solvency of the Social Security trust fund while also providing fiscally responsible, targeted tax relief and substantive education and economic development,” Mr. Lucas said in a statement released from his Washington office Friday.
“I support tax relief for working families,” he said. “I also support saving Social Security and Medicare.”
Earlier this week, the GOP-led House and Senate Budget Committees passed budget packages that promised to cut taxes by $778 billion over 10 years and provide more money for schools and defense.
Mr. Lucas is drawing partisan criticism at home for voting against a Republican-backed budget plan earlier this week in the House Budget Committee.
“A Republican plan came out of the House Budget Committee to cut Americans' taxes by nearly $800 billion over 10 years, and he voted against it,” said Jay Hall of Florence, the recently elected chairman of the 4th District Republican Party.
Mr. Hall also took at shot at Mr. Lucas for claiming to be a “common sense conservative,” which was the Democrat's campaign slogan in winning last year's U.S. House race over Boone County Republican state Sen. Gex “Jay” Williams.
“Ken Lucas is proving he's a common sense conservative,” Mr. Hall said Friday. “He's only conservative when he has to be, and he'll support the Democrats on party-line votes because he has enough common sense to know that's where his (campaign) money will come from.”
Six weeks after President Clinton proposed his 2000 budget, the House and Senate plans were the GOP's first chance to display its fiscal priorities in writing. Democrats said Republicans would do nothing to reinforce Social Security and Medicare for baby boomers' retirements, bestow overly large tax cuts and force deep spending cuts — all the while imperiling the economy.
“The Republican plan puts risky tax schemes first and Social Security last,” Vice President Al Gore told black newspaper publishers visiting the White House.
“I appeal to the Republican leadership to abandon this nostalgia for the recession of the past, and this nostalgia for risky tax schemes and roulette-style economics,” Mr. Gore said.
The full House and Senate are expected to approve both budgets next week and pass a compromise plan next month. In the months to come, though, the GOP and the Clinton administration seem certain to battle over spending and tax legislation.
John Lapp, Mr. Lucas' chief of staff, said the Democrats as well as Republicans are ignoring debt reduction in their budget bills.
“We need to take the politics out of the budget process,” Mr. Lapp said Friday. “It is time for both sides to come together to develop a plan which takes a fiscally responsible approach to saving Social Security and Medicare, provides targeted tax relief and pays down the national debt.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
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