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Friday, March 7, 2008
A birthday gift to rev up hopes of Republicans
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A legislative session that for Republicans had all the makings of disaster turned suddenly last week — demonstrating once again why nobody should bet on elections that are more than a few days away.
A week ago Friday, rank-and-file House Republicans were in a deep funk about the fall elections.
Democrats in one afternoon lifted them out of it. Bloodbath averted. Obama surge neutralized.
I’d have to hogtie you to force you to sit still long enough to hear the full explanation of why Georgia House Democrats — minus seven — voted last week to deny tax relief to 93 percent of Georgians who own cars, trucks and motorcycles. But they did.
Some votes can be explained to neighbors who don’t pay much attention to the games politicians play in Atlanta and Washington. Some, including this one, can’t.
Rank-and-file Republicans were disturbed because House Speaker Glenn Richardson was still insisting he’d make them vote on a tax shift proposal — a new tax on groceries and services to generate money for property tax relief — that would have walked incumbents into a bloodbath in the primary and in the general election.
Gleeful Democrats were beside themselves at the prospect of running against Republicans who could be accused of supporting 175 new taxes. Had Richardson pushed that tax bill onto the floor, it would have been the end of his speakership.
But he didn’t.
He dropped the proposed tax on groceries and services His tax bill was morphed instead into a proposal by Speaker Pro Tem Mark Burkhalter of Alpharetta to end the “birthday tax,” the ad valorem tax that Georgians pay on their birthdays to renew their car tags. It would have saved owners of almost 7 million personal vehicles $637 million, the sum counties collected in 2007.
This is genuine tax relief. Not a swap. It is the real deal, getting Republicans back to what should have been their roots.
The proposed constitutional amendment on the floor Wednesday would also have frozen property assessments at 2008 levels and limited them to 2 percent per year for homes and 3 percent for other property.
Overall, property tax collections by local governments would be limited to new construction, plus the rate of inflation in government’s cost of goods and services. That rate would have averaged 5.05 percent over the past five years, Richardson said. The cap would not apply to revenues from other sources.
The proposed cap could have been raised by voters in a referendum. The ballot question would have to be phrased: “Shall property taxes be increased …?”
That cap was a primary reason Democrats gave for voting against a tax break for owners of 530,362 vehicles in Cobb, 586,995 in Gwinnett, 527,555 in Fulton and 436,997 in DeKalb.
Dumb. Seriously dumb. Pick any barber shop in Georgia. Walk in and explain that you didn’t oppose giving patrons a major tax break on their cars but voted against it because the proposed amendment would have limited the increase that cities and counties could impose on their homes. And, for good measure, throw in some gibberish about the state “owing” local school systems some back funding — and that’s why you voted against a tax break for almost every family in the state.
Good luck.
Four of the seven Democrats who broke ranks — Bobby Parham of Milledgeville, Alan Powell of Hartwell, Jay Shaw of Lakeland and Ellis Black of Valdosta — represent areas where Democrats have lost ground for most of the past decade. The other three were Bob Bryant of Garden City, Kevin Levitas of Atlanta and Amy Carter of Valdosta.
The proposed amendment lost 110-62, with 120 needed. One Republican, Tom Dickson of Cohutta, voted no.
Had it passed and been approved by voters in November, Georgians would have gotten $672 million in tax relief, the sum projected for the 2011 fiscal year. That’s money politicians would not have been tempted to spend.
Republicans were headed to an election-year disaster. And then came the Democrats. …
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John-o-meter, car tax, a cool kiss
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thinking Right’s weekend free-for-all. Pick a topic:
Hillary wins Ohio and Texas. The John-o-meter registers a 43. If she wins one more small state, Atlanta Congressman John Lewis is back to 50-50. Win Pennsylvania on April 22 and Lewis re-endorses Hillary.
When Republicans are in danger of jumping off the cliff, they can always count on Democrats to save them. In one of the dumber moves of this legislative session, Democrats voted as a party against giving every Georgian who owns a car, truck or motorcycle relief from what Speaker Pro Tem Mark Burkhalter (R-Alpharetta) calls the “birthday tax.” It comes due on your birthday. Six Democrats broke ranks and voted for lower taxes: Reps. Bob Bryant of Garden City, Alan Powell of Hartwell, Bobby Parham of Milledgeville, Kevin Levitas of Atlanta, Amy Carter of Valdosta and Jay Shaw of Lakeland. One Republican, Tom Dickson of Cohutta, doesn’t get it.
Prince Harry rocks. He wanted to be “one of the lads,” an ordinary soldier pulling his weight on the front — and was.
Ever realize how many stories containing numbers are launched by some advocacy group pushing an agenda? Telling us, for example, that, based on federal taxes collected here, the war in Iraq costs Georgians between $86.5 billion and $144.1 billion is meaningless except as anti-war propaganda. The calculation is done by a group called the National Priorities Project in Northampton, Mass.
And what should that number be? Likewise, a report by the Pew Center on the States in Washington, a “private group that promotes” alternatives to jailing, finds that Georgia locks up 1.02 people per thousand, second in the country. Give us more law-abiding citizens and we’ll give you fewer lock-ups. The group also tells us that Georgia spends 50 cents on incarceration for every dollar spent on higher education. So should Georgia spend more on higher education? Don’t try to figure it out. It’s just feel-good liberalism.
Sad commentary on “community” that former Clayton County school board member Norreese Haynes lived in Cobb County for two years and nobody in Clayton knew it — and wouldn’t have but for a domestic dispute in Cobb and the accreditation disaster in Clayton. When the truth was discovered, he was voted off the board.
Think health insurance premiums are high now? Wait until Congress enacts legislation to require employers offering coverage for both mental and physical illnesses to give them parity. The bill, which passed 268-148, would mandate coverage for conditions such as jet lag and sexual dysfunction, said U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-Marietta). “Can you imagine an employer being willing to cover things like that?” Here’s the deal: On the Democrats’ watch, business is made an extension of government, mandated to provide services that liberals want but lack the public support to create in the public sector. On the Republicans’ watch, business tries to dump those costs back on government — which is how, if we’re not careful, we get to HillaryCare.
Tyson Chief Executive Richard Bond says that government mandates to produce more ethanol are the chief reason prices for his chicken, beef and pork products are expected to increase by almost $800 million this year. Grains are 40 percent of the cost of producing chicken and 80 percent of the cost of producing beef. Congress may be responsible for a dumber idea than putting corn in the gas tank, but it’s hard to know when.
Clever of the Chattanooga mayor to send a pickup load of bottled water to the Capitol in response to claims that the state line is marked incorrectly and the Tennessee River actually flows through Georgia. He described it as a “cool wet kiss of friendship.” State Sen. David Shafer (R-Duluth) accepted it in the spirit offered: “as down payment on the billions of gallons of water” to come. Aspects may be humorous, but this is a legitimate claim for Georgia to pursue.
Has John Lewis changed his endorsement yet?
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