THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 22, 1995 TAG: 9502220020
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 53 lines
The Republican majority in the House has worked its way through half of the Contract With America in half of its self-imposed 100 days. Now comes the hard part.
The procedural reforms of the House sailed through without much trouble in the first days of the session. A rewrite of last year's crime bill, a balanced-budget amendment and some reforms of national security to give Congress more control at the expense of the executive branch all have passed and await action in the Senate. Whether they will fare as well there remains to be seen.
What's left? The House must now pass welfare reform including controversial provisions to cut off unwed mothers under 18 and legal immigrants. Tax reform must be passed that includes breaks for seniors, capital-gains cuts, a middle-class income tax cut, business incentives and write-offs for depreciation.
Tort reform is promised that will make it harder to sue the manufactures of products. And the House must make good on its promise to limit the terms of its own members. All of those steps could prove divisive. Not only will Democrats object and interest groups apply pressure, but the Republicans are divided among themselves on some major provisions.
Looming behind all of these policy initiatives is the inescapable issue of money. The Republicans have vowed to put the budget process on the glide path to a balanced budget by 2002. According to the CBO, to get there the Congress will have to cut $1 trillion out of projected spending over the next seven years.
And that doesn't include $370 billion that Republican tax cuts will cost according to estimates by the Joint Tax Committee. That comes to a grand total of $1.37 trillion in spending cuts that Republicans will have to extract from seven annual budgets that total approximately $12 trillion.
If all government spending were on the table, that would mean a reduction in spending of $12.50 out of every $100. However, interest on the debt, defense and Social Security are all supposed to be off-limits. That means a cut of $25 out of every $100 left on the table.
Crafting a plan to do that in the next 50 days (or 500) will tax the ingenuity of the Republicans. Passing it will present an even more daunting challenge. Paradoxically, if they do manage to do all they've promised, they may find themselves respected for their skill and denounced for their accomplishments. Alas, the voters want to cut the budget while keeping their entitlements and paying less taxes. That does not compute. by CNB