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After
being handed a serious defeat on Election Day Gov.
Mark R. Warner has retreated to his comfort zone of
predicting a fiscal catastrophe. (In case you had
forgotten, Mark Warner had promised the Kerry
campaign that Virginia’s electoral votes were in the bag for the
Democrats.) This time, however, the calamity is
projected to hit our state in the years following
Warner’s departure from office.
An
article published in The Washington Post on
November 6, 2004, outlined the Governor’s new dire predictions of
fiscal disaster, which are to follow a record of
huge budget surpluses. In outbursts reminiscent of
Chicken Little’s “the sky is falling” parody,
Warner is predicting serious budgetary shortfalls
for the rest of the decade.
Worried
that legislative action could balloon the deficit to
nearly $1 billion, Warner insisted that in the 2005
session the General Assembly must hold the line
on new spending. Even if lawmakers don't go on a new
spending spree, he still foresees budget shortfalls
to the tune of $250 million for 2007 and $31 million
for 2008.
Warner
must think that the citizens of our Commonwealth are
suffering from a collective memory loss. This is the
same governor who predicted earlier this year a
biennial budgetary shortfall of $1.5 billion and
then proposed a $1 billion tax increase.
A
number of groups, including the Virginia
Club for Growth, insisted that Warner’s tax
increase was totally unnecessary. But Warner had a
number of willing accomplices in the state Senate
who went out of their way to enact the largest tax
increase in the history of Virginia.
Senate
Finance Committee Chairman John Chichester,
R-Fredericksburg, a proponent of massive tax
increases, along with a bunch of other tax and spend
liberals in the state Senate cornered the House of
Delegates into enacting a huge tax increase. In
retrospect, the tax increase was not needed.
Right
after the new taxes were enacted, but before the new
tax revenues started to roll in, the state had
already amassed a $324 million surplus. This led a
number of observers to conclude that Warner and his
administration intentionally underreported the
projected tax revenues to General Assembly members
to give them cover for – some would say to coerce
them into – enacting the tax increase.
The
new tax revenues are now flooding the Virginia
Treasury; recent projections call for the surplus to go as high a $1 billion. So much for
Warner’s imaginary budgetary shortfall and other
dire predictions that culminated in a $1.3 billion
tax increase this biennium.
But
Warner has consistently gone out of his way to
misrepresent the facts or outright lie to his
constituents. After all, this is the same Mark
Warner who in his 2001 gubernatorial campaign
categorically stated that he will not raise our
taxes. He even accosted his opponent for daring to
suggest that he would raise taxes.
Within
his first year in office Warner was campaigning in
support of the Sales Tax Referendum – a 22 percent
increase in the sales tax for residents of Northern
Virginia and Hampton Roads.
The
same year he went on a campaign across the state
claiming that he had cut $6 billion – yes that’s
billion with a “b” – from the state’s budget
and had eliminated more than 3,700 employees from
the government’s payrolls. The fact is that
government spending increased by $2.5 billion in the
first two years of Warner’s tenure. So much for
truth in governance!
When
in 2004 the governor proposed massive tax increases,
a friendly and cooperating press never bothered to
question him why any tax increases were necessary
given his reported budget cuts. Nor did the press
make an issue of his campaign promise not to raise
taxes. Warner just told them that circumstances had
changed and everyone was happy to look the other
way.
But
the Warner Administration’s many lies don’t stop
here. In April 2004, the Fairfax County Taxpayer
Alliance prepared
a flyer for the Finance Committee of the House
of Delegates documenting the numerous misconceptions
about the Virginia
state budget that had been propagated by Warner, his
administration, and their willing accomplices.
Joseph
Goebbels, the Nazi minister of propaganda, said that
“it is the absolute right of the State to
supervise the formation of public opinion.” Given
the fact that Gov. Warner continues to enjoy high
job approval ratings – irrespective of
his many half-truths, lies, and distortions – a
disinterested observer is left with only one
possible conclusion: Our governor has elevated the
art of propaganda to a new level.
In
the same Washington Post article, the Speaker
of the House of Delegates, William Howell, R-
Fredericksburg, was quoted saying that the House
would have to hold the line on new spending. Howell
said that Del. Vince Callahan, R-McLean, chairman of
the House Appropriation Committee, and Sen.
Chichester will have to convince the legislators
“to hold true to principles.”
Excuse
me for pointing out that the emperor has no clothes!
Howell is placing his confidence on the same guys
that saddled us with a massive tax increase this
year.
Chichester
wasn’t happy with Warner’s $1 billion tax hike
proposal and counter-proposed a $3 billion increase.
As to Callahan, he borrowed a page from John
Kerry’s operations manual – he voted for the tax
increase before voting against it.
I
do not mean to open old wounds, but it was the total
collapse of the House Republican leadership that led
to the unprecedented tax increase this year.
Howell’s latest comments should not give comfort
to anyone; he only reinforces the notion that there
is no plan in place to stave off another assault
from the tax and spend legislative contingent. As a
matter of fact,
Chichester
has already gone on record saying that we need to
raise new taxes for such things as transportation
and infrastructure investments.
Abraham
Lincoln said “You may fool all the people some of
the time, you can even fool some of the people all
of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people
all the time.” So far our governor and his willing
accomplices in the General Assembly seem to be
getting away with fooling all the people all the
time!
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November 15, 2004
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