ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, April 9, 1997 TAG: 9704090016
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Cal Thomas
SOURCE: CAL THOMAS
ONE OF the often-heard refrains is that political campaigns last too long and cost too much. The AFL-CIO is doing its part to make sure they cost more and last longer.
Barely five months after the last big election and 19 months before the next one, the union is spending its members' money in 19 congressional districts. AFL-CIO commercials are targeting 12 Republicans and seven Democrats in what it describes as ``issues education.'' Like the previous multimillion-dollar campaign, these districts are below the national radar screen, and the union had hoped they would go largely unnoticed.
In the Wichita, Kan., district of Rep. Todd Tiahrt, a second-term Republican, the AFL-CIO has budgeted $1 million. At the heart of the commercials are attacks on conservatives for supporting policies and legislation that allegedly cost American workers jobs and weaken the public schools. The unions have been waging a war for decades against tax credits for multinational corporations. The tax issues in the ad campaign are the foreign tax credit and tax deferral for foreign income.
The AFL-CIO has consistently opposed this IRS code provision. In 1976, the unions argued for repealing the foreign tax credit. But Jimmy Carter favored its retention and the unions supported him anyway. In 1986, the AFL-CIO recommended the tax credit be reduced to a deduction, but neither the Reagan administration nor the Democratic Congress complied by offering legislation. The unions again expressed their support for foreign tax credit repeal in 1993, when lobbying against NAFTA. Now, 20 years after first lobbying Jimmy Carter, the AFL-CIO is fighting the tax credit again, hoping to pressure Congress into adopting a bad policy through negative advertising.
Repeal of the tax credit would result in a tax increase and harm America's global competitiveness. And it would cost American jobs, something the union claims to want to preserve. In 1995, 11 million jobs were supported by exports. That's about one out of every 12 jobs in the United States. Between 1986 and 1994, U.S. jobs supported by exports rose 63 percent, four times faster than overall private job growth.
On education, another subject of the union commercials, the AFL-CIO supports more federal control over local schools, parents, teachers and communities. Conservative Republicans and Democrats want more power in the hands of parents and communities.
Two Wichita television stations declined to carry the commercials. Two others carried them. The AFL-CIO apparently considers this a test run. If the impact is regarded as positive, more money will be spent in these and other districts.
In 1995 and early '96, liberal Democrat and union commercials went unanswered for months as Republicans kept their advertising powder dry for the national campaign. That allowed the left to successfully plant in the public mind negative images about Republicans. This time, while the AFL-CIO is spending its members' money extra early, Republicans had better respond quickly and effectively. Last year, the unions were successful in knocking off 11 of their 32 targets at a cost of about $1 million per freshman.
Tiahrt responded to the ads by saying, ``This is not a time to campaign, but a time to govern. ... The union bosses are trying to intimidate me to stray from my goals of reducing wasteful Washington spending, a balanced budget and lower taxes. But I'm not intimidated. They picked the wrong guy.''
In an attempt to curtail the unfair power advantage of big labor, Sens. Paul Coverdell, a Georgia Republican, and Lauch Faircloth, a North Carolina Republican, have reintroduced the National Right to Work Act. The bill would repeal those provisions of federal law that authorize private-sector contracts forcing workers to pay union dues as a condition of employment. Rep. Bob Goodlatte, a Virginia Republican, has introduced similar legislation in the House.
The legislation would prevent unions like the AFL-CIO from unfairly taking union dues and applying them to causes many in the rank and file do not necessarily support. An effective blow for campaign finance reform could be struck by passing this bill. It could help shorten political campaigns, and it would certainly help reduce their cost.
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