Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 15, 1993 TAG: 9304150172
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: From The Washington Post and The Baltimore Sun
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
NEW TAX PROPOSAL STUDIED
The White House on Wednesday opened the door to imposing a value-added tax to pay for its health-care program, after weeks of repeatedly insisting such a tax was not an option.While three senior administration officials, including White House Communications Director George Stephanopoulos, were preparing the ground for the possibility of such a tax proposal, President Clinton was silent on that subject. Instead, he was promoting another piece of his agenda, his economic-stimulus program, discussing a compromise with Senate Minority Leader Robert Dole, R-Kan., by telephone.
House Republicans, insisting that Clinton is just another tax-and-spend liberal, said they will stage town meetings across the country Saturday to bash the $116.3 billion economic-stimulus package as a budget-buster.
"Our themes are simple," said Rep. Dick Armey, R-Texas, who announced that Republicans would hold 19 town meetings in 13 states. "Raising taxes is not the answer. We should cut spending first."
Clinton, meanwhile, invoked the same theme that he used in his presidential campaign: asserting that the worst thing political leaders can do about the nation's stubborn 7 percent unemployment is to ignore it.
"I don't have all the answers," he mayors at a conference in Arlington, Va. "But I do know this: Doing nothing is not the answer."
Stephanopoulos said "modifications" in Clinton's economic-stimulus package were being prepared to make it more acceptable to Senate Republicans, who have voted to stop it.
On the tax issue, Stephanopoulos abandoned previous statements that a value-added tax - which is imposed at each stage of the manufacture of a product - would not be used to pay for health-care reform.
"I'm acknowledging that the task force has studied this proposal," Stephanopoulos said. "I am also stating that the president has not made a decision on it."
Clinton in February said some kind of national sales tax made sense for the country, then immediately retreated, saying he envisioned a 10-to-15-year time frame for such a change.