Today, the Romney campaign came out swinging. In their first official Rudy exposé the Giuliani “tax and tax again” record is thrown into stark relief. The research is pretty extensive and makes an excellent case against the fiscal policy that Rudy advocated while Mayor.

“Earlier Today, Mr. Giuliani Assailed The Legislature For Seeking To End The Commuter Tax, Saying That If Anything, It Should Be Higher.” (Clifford J. Levy, “Leaders In Albany Plan To Eliminate Tax On Commuters,” The New York Times, 5/13/99)

FACT: Mayor Giuliani Fought To Tax People For Going To Work:

University Of Pennsylvania’s Factcheck.Org: Mayor Giuliani “Fought To Keep” The Commuter Tax. “Also, it’s worth noting that Giuliani’s list doesn’t mention one tax he fought to keep – New York City’s commuter tax, which was lifted by the state Legislature in 1999. The mayor and the city council sued the state to maintain the tax – .45 percent of earned income for most of the people affected – but lost in court. The city had been collecting about $360 million per year from commuters from New Jersey, Connecticut and other parts of New York state.” (Factcheck.org, “Giuliani’s Tax Puffery,” FactCheck.org Website, http://www.factcheck.org/, 7/27/07)

FACT: Mayor Giuliani Not Only Wanted To Keep The Tax, He Wanted To Raise It:

Mayor Giuliani Said That The Commuter Tax Should Be Increased Rather Than Eliminated. “Earlier today, Mr. Giuliani assailed the Legislature for seeking to end the commuter tax, saying that if anything, it should be higher.” (Clifford J. Levy, “Leaders In Albany Plan To Eliminate Tax On Commuters,” The New York Times, 5/13/99)

Mayor Giuliani Threatened Politicians Who Considered Voting For The Tax Cut. “At the City Hall event, Giuliani also warned Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) and any other city-elected backers of the tax cut: ‘Voting against the interests of the city, somehow, some way, you will pay for it.’” (Dan Janison, “Former Foes United,” [New York] Newsday, 5/17/99)

FACT: Mayor Giuliani Called The $360 Million A Year Commuter Tax “Modest,” And Said The City Was “Entitled” To The Tax:

By 1999, More Than 750,000 Non-City Resident Commuters Were Paying The Commuter Tax. “The 33-year-old tax on more than 750,000 non-city residents who commute to jobs in the city rakes in $360 million a year for the Big Apple, when payments by New Yorkers and out-of-staters are counted.” (Gregg Birnbaum, et al. “Shel-Shocked Pataki Will Get Tax-Kill Bill Next Week,” New York Post, 5/20/99)

Mayor Giuliani Justified The Tax As “Modest.” “‘Sometimes, the game of politics gets out of control,’ Giuliani said. ‘This is a very modest tax.’” (Dan Janison, “Former Foes United,” [New York] Newsday, 5/17/99)

Mayor Giuliani Said That The City Government Was “Very Much Entitled To This Very Small Tax.” “‘The city should not feel that it’s doing anybody a favor here,’ Mr. Giuliani said. ‘We are very much entitled to this very small tax.’” (Clifford J. Levy, “Legislature Acts Quickly To Repeal Commuter Tax,” The New York Times, 5/18/99)

* Mayor Giuliani Administration Official: “We Want To Retain That Money.” “‘We are going into this lawsuit in a very optimistic fashion,’ said Michael D. Hess, the city’s Corporation Counsel, who joined Mr. Giuliani in an afternoon news conference at City Hall. ‘We want to retain that money for the good uses that the city will put it to.’” (Abby Goodnough, “Giuliani Files Lawsuit Challenging Tax Repeal,” The New York Times, 6/3/99)

Mayor Giuliani Said That Suburbanites “Should Feel An Obligation” To Pay The Tax. “On his weekly WABC radio show, Giuliani said that suburbanites ‘should feel an obligation to make a contribution to the city that is doing a lot for them.’” (Robert Hardt Jr., “Albany Tax Slash Has City Weighing Layoffs,” New York Post, 5/22/99)

FACT: Mayor Giuliani Sued Republicans In Albany So He Could Keep The Commuter Tax:

Mayor Giuliani Immediately Threatened Legal Action In Order To Keep The Commuter Tax. “A spokeswoman for Mr. Giuliani said tonight that he would file suit to retain the tax, maintaining that the state cannot end it without the permission of the city.” (Clifford J. Levy, “Leaders In Albany Plan To Eliminate Tax On Commuters,” The New York Times, 5/13/99)

* Mayor Giuliani: “We Will Challenge It. We Will Go To Court And We Will Win.” (Gregg Birnbaum, “Rudy Goes To War With Albany,” New York Post, 5/14/99)

Governor Pataki Signed The Repeal Into Law, Despite Giuliani’s Protests. “Gov. George Pataki signed the law eliminating New York City’s commuter tax yesterday at the Rockville Centre train station, much to the delight of hometown state Sen. Dean Skelos, who for more than a decade championed calls to remove the tax.” (Monte R. Young, “Pataki Signs Commuter Tax Repeal,” [New York] Newsday, 5/28/99)

Mayor Giuliani Filed A Lawsuit Challenging The State’s Authority To Repeal The Tax. “Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and City Council Speaker Peter Vallone joined forces and filed a lawsuit yesterday to challenge the Legislature’s repeal of the city’s commuter tax, insisting the measure was unconstitutional… The suit argues the Legislature passed the measure too quickly and did not receive city permission in what’s called a Home Rule message.” (Liz Willen, “City Sues Over Tax Repeal,” [New York] Newsday, 6/3/99)

The State Supreme Court Rejected Mayor Giuliani’s Argument And Ruled The Entire Tax Unconstitutional. “A Manhattan judge on Friday, in effect, rewrote the state law repealing the New York City commuter tax, an action which authorities said could cost the city more than $360 million a year. Supreme Court Justice Barry Cozier said the law, which repealed the payroll tax only for state residents but left it intact for out-of-state commuters, was unconstitutional. His ruling means the tax is eliminated for all commuters…Cozier agreed with lawyers for New Jersey, Connecticut and two private individuals that the new tax law, scheduled to take effect July 1, violates several provisions of the U.S. Constitution. The plaintiffs had argued that taxing some commuters and not others was unfair to those who still would be forced to pay. The judge rejected the city’s argument that the law is special legislation requiring a so-called home-rule message before any change is made. A home-rule message is a request from the city to the state to alter a law affecting city affairs.” (“Judge Eliminates Commuter Tax,” [New York] Newsday, 6/26/99)

FACT: After Losing In Court, Mayor Giuliani Continued To Fight To Keep The Commuter Tax:

The Giuliani Administration Vowed To Appeal The Ruling. “City officials said the court ruling would be appealed.” (“Judge Eliminates Commuter Tax,” [New York] Newsday, 6/26/99)

The New York Court Of Appeals Rejected Mayor Giuliani’s Appeal. “Deepening a financial blow to New York City, the state’s highest court said yesterday that state lawmakers acted within their authority last year when they repealed a city tax on commuters and that the ‘discriminatory’ income tax still levied on out-of-state commuters must also be ended. That means out-of-state commuters will be reimbursed for the city tax they’ve paid retroactive to July 1 of last year, when the repeal for in-state commuters took effect. The city had collected the 0.45 percent tax since 1966.” (Kara Blond, “Court Of Appeals Kill City’s Commuter Tax,” [New York] Newsday, 4/5/00)

The recent meeting hosted by the “Club for Growth” (the same event that someone panned McCain for dissing) proved to be a very successful event for Mitt.

Momentum is his according the WSJ (actual excerpts can be found here):

The guy with the momentum is former entrepreneur and Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. He’s signed an anti-tax pledge, bemoaned excessive regulation, called for cheaper energy with domestic drilling, and laid out (in detailed Power Point presentations) the coming fiscal disasters that are Social Security and Medicare. He took another plunge yesterday, unveiling a broad-strokes tax agenda.

While short on details, he laid out a marker for the field, calling for lower marginal tax rates, a more competitive corporate tax and the end of the death tax. This isn’t necessarily a surprise, given Mr. Romney’s economic team is largely made up of the Bush tax-cut brain trust, including former Council of Economic Advisers chief Glenn Hubbard, his successor, Greg Mankiw, and Brian Reardon. Mr. Romney also scored a coup with economist John Cogan, who knows budgets inside-out, and is a tax-cutter to boot.

What attracted many of these economists to the Romney team was the former governor’s success, in a liberal state, of beating back big-tax proposals and instead choosing to erase deficits by hacking away at spending. Mr. Romney’s challenge will now be in convincing economic conservatives that his tax plan, and other pro-growth talk, is more than just election rhetoric. In particular, he’ll need to do some explaining about his Massachusetts health-care plan, which Mr. Romney touted as a market-based reform, but was more about new government regulation.

The team least happy with this early Romney tax marker is surely John McCain’s. The super-senator has been unable to get much traction with this second bid for the White House, thanks in part to conservatives’ distrust of his economic credentials. The maverick was born out of the old austerity wing of the GOP, tough on spending, big on balanced budgets, grave about the need for entitlement reform. These were the traits Mr. McCain stressed in his last run, and by the look of his new team, little will change this time around.

Ramesh at NRO’s The Corner had this to say:

Almost everything is off the record at the Club for Growth’s “winter” conference, but I can say that the dozen or so attendees to whom I spoke after Mitt Romney’s speech were impressed.

Since the campaign issued a press release about the speech, I can also comment a little about its contents. Romney hit every one of the club’s buttons. He came out against most trade barriers, for reductions in marginal tax rates, against the “death tax,” for cuts in corporate tax rates to make our rates comparable to those of other countries, for federal tort reform, and for scaling back Sarbanes-Oxley. He repeated his call for federal spending to shrink by one percent in real terms every year.

A few attendees complained about the vagueness of Romney’s proposals. While he has come out for more detailed and substantial tax cuts than Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, or Fred Thompson, he didn’t say what corporate and personal income tax rates he wanted, or offer an estimate of the budget impact of his tax cuts. On Social Security, he spoke against tax cuts but otherwise merely offered a list of options—with personal accounts the last one on the list.

All in all, it seems like a perfectly fine economic plan if you’re looking for a conventional conservative platform and a smart businessman to sell it. I don’t think it is a great tax plan for the general election, however, and Republicans need one.

The New American Challenge. First, economic conservatism

Earlier in the week we launched the first of our online tools, an interactive issues chart. Today we get down to business with an easy to read and understand FAQ on the topics that people have questions about.

CLICK ON THE GRAPHIC BELOW TO VIEW THE TOOL.

Here’s a quick excerpt from Gov. Romney’s address in Detroit this last week. One thing I love about this clip. He brings out the PowerPoint in full force! A picture says a thousand words:

Gov. Mike Huckabee was on This Week Sunday morning and stated that in more words or less that there is nothing wrong with higher taxes as long as it is being spent correctly. In issues of health care, housing, and education, there should be higher taxes to be able to afford programs that help out the neediest of people.

Now, this sounds all well and good, except that in reality, the Federal government has a poor record of using taxpayer’s money appropriately. In the past, billions were spent in helping the poor and needy to get out of poverty and to improve their lives. Billions were spent on education to help troubled schools compete with better schools.

Yet, all of this spending that was done has not ended poverty or helped kids become educated. Health Care, under government’s watch, has given some people access to medical care, but kept many from not receiving from health care, due to the bureaucracy that is involved and the waste that has gone on. Huckabee’s answer that taxes are needed to help make things better won’t help but hurt since government would be involved in issues that could be solved through private charity or action.

Looking at his record as governor of Arkansas, he raised taxes to try and fund improvements to the state, yet they rank in the bottom for health care, economic growth, and education. If raising taxes are a good thing, Arkansas would be having great growth in all of these areas.

Mitt Romney offers a contrast of leading Massachusetts in economic growth, improving schools and health care during his four years in office without raising taxes, compared with Mike Huckabee’s 8 years in office and lack of improvements in any of those categories while raising or implementing a series of taxes. Mike Huckabee is a good and decent man, but he is wrong about tax, education, and health care policy and raising taxes will not solve any of those problems.

You can watch a portion of the exchange here

Rasmussen Reports notes that Mitt’s favorable ratings are up 6 points (from 29% to 35%). Unfavorables dropping from 34% to 31%.

34% of voters still don’t know Mitt Romney which give the Governor a distinct advantage to lay out his case without a political biases.

Granted there are other biases afoot as this NY Times article notes.

Elsewhere, the influential Club for Growth lauded Romney’s speech Wednesday in Detroit:

The other presidential candidates should follow Governor Romney’s lead and propose similar, if not more extensive, measures to protect American taxpayers and promote continued economic expansion.

In case you missed it here’s a quick excerpt from Romney’s speech:

It is time to make saving easy in America. I believe people should be allowed to earn interest, dividends and capital gains up to a certain amount a year, tax free and without restrictions on how or when their savings and investments are spent. As an example, let’s say we chose $5,000 for joint filers as the annual tax free figure for dividends, interest and capital gains. This would help middle class families to be able to save and to invest – and spend their savings the American way: any way they want.

Governor Romney today delivered a thorough economic address to the Detroit Economic Club. An excerpt:

“One hundred years ago, Golden Jubilee for Queen Victoria, unthinkable England would ever be surpassed as a superpower. But 50 years later, America roared passed.

“Inconceivable to us today that America could ever be passed. We’ve been competing with Europe for so long that we’ve gotten a little over-confident. But look east. Asia is emerging as an economic powerhouse. Great news, can buy our goods and products – I was pleased to see all the Buicks when I was in Beijing in December. But also a real challenge. Will Rogers: ‘even if you’re on the right track, if you don’t move, you’ll get run over.’

“Standing still isn’t a viable option. The question for America is this: what direction should we take?”

Afterwards, the Club for Growth issued a press release containing the glowing approval of Club President Pat Toomey:

“Governor Romney outlined today an economic platform that is, generally speaking, very pro-growth despite the surprising limit he suggests for tax-free savings,” Toomey said. “As the governor develops the specifics of his economic policies, we hope he will boldly build upon the limited government, free-market policies he discussed today.”

Finally, the Governor appeared on CNBC’s Kudlow & Company for a detailed interview on economic policy. Here’s a segment on YouTube.

It’s clear that no Presidential candidate on either side of the ballot is as prepared to discuss issues of economic importance as Mitt Romney is.

• “The easy way to fix any problem is to go to the people and say you have to pay more money, but that's not what the job of management is. The job of management is to find ways to permanently and structurally change the costs of our structure such that we can have a balanced budget without always raising taxes every time people think there's a need."

• Governor Mitt Romney, Boston Herald, March 22, 2002

~ Mike

With the inauguration of Deval Patrick the Commonwealth of Massachusetts returns to the suicidal tendencies of it’s past. Apparently the inauguration parties have left Patrick a little punch-drunk as he eagerly overturns the spending cuts of the Romney administration:

Haverhill, for instance, will receive $2.6 million in Hale Hospital debt relief, money needed to keep the city’s budget balanced.

Funding for Pettengill House, the Newburyport YWCA, the Lower Merrimack Valley Boys & Girls Club, Salisbury’s Historical Society, Amesbury’s Cultural Council and Salisbury’s Chamber of Commerce also were restored.

Salem State College, which lost $800,000 for its nursing program, will see that money. The state will also pay $500,000 for Peabody flood prevention and $400,000 for the dredging of Crystal Lake.

Romney cut $425 million in state spending on Nov. 9, saying there wasn’t money to pay for those items. Link

Romney left office with the distinction of having governed every year with a balanced budget. The last year was highlighted by Romney’s constant vetoing of the state legislatures spending sprees. Of course kids in candy shops never want to be denied, and the outrage of the liberal legislature was oozing as we well remember.

Some of you might remember the other Romney cuts that Patrick has now restored:

1. Victorian Street lighting in Melrose ($200,000)

2. A gazebo for Braintree ($100,000- thats an expensive gazebo!)

3. Study for the internal combustion engine ($4,000,000- isn’t that Ford’s job?)

4. Money for the Hyannis Athletic Association ($75,000 well I guess Ted Kennedy is a little portly!)

Yet where the stupidity ends the irony begins. In a remarkable show of cognitive dissonance Pork-Barrel-Patrick has claimed Romney left a deficit “hidden” in the details that Patrick will somehow fix:

“It’s a very significant structural deficit,” Patrick said. “We have to deal with that, and we will deal with that. There’s no reason to panic.” Link

(I have no doubt this claim is brought to you by the DNC commitee for 2008)

There wouldn’t be a reason to panic if a) There was really a deficit and b) Patrick was intent on cutting spending. Yet when Patrick has plans to fix his imaginary deficit while increasing spending, one is left to wonder how he will accomplish this.

Barbara Anderson, founder of Citizens for Limited Taxation, said Patrick’s pronouncement gives her a sense of deja vu.

She said a new, reform-minded governor named Michael Dukakis came into office claiming he was left a fiscal mess in 1975 and responded by raising taxes.

Like a dog returning to it’s vomit, Massachusetts has decided return to the days of high spending and high taxes to fix a mess that never existed. How often do the liberals need to be reminded that cutting taxes and spending always leads to a balanced budget? How often do liberals need to be reminded of the failures of past administrations who have gone down this same road?