Mike Thompson: “on April 24, President Bush told the workers of Canton, Ohio that the best way to solve the deficit is to grow the…”

“on April 24, President Bush told the workers of Canton, Ohio that the best way to solve the deficit is to grow the revenues--and have fiscal sanity in Washington, DC. As a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, I've been championing fiscal sanity since I first came to Congress. But, I just don't see the fiscal sanity of passing a $550 billion tax cut package that we flat out can't afford. Especially when it's a tax package touted as help for the working person and the elderly but structured to help those in the top income brackets. The corner stone of this bill is a proposal to reduce the tax paid on dividends and capital gains. We've heard all about how this is going to stimulate the economy and create jobs, and boy is it ever going to help out seniors, with over half of them receiving dividend income. Well, yes. Over half of our Nation's seniors receive dividend income. And, this bill will cut their taxes. But, if they make less than $50,000 a year, their tax cut will be a grand total of $44. Since the average senior income is far less than $50,000, it doesn't seem that this bill is going to help seniors as much as some might like you to think. And, this bill certainly doesn't help America's workers as much as some might like you to think. The White House claims that this bill will create 190,000 jobs in this year alone. That's great, because the Labor Department says that we just lost 190,000 jobs in March and April.”