[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 16]
[Senate]
[Pages 21971-21974]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                 TAXES

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I wish to speak about a no-no subject--
taxes. I get really worn out when I go home and hear the local folks 
are against taxes. I came to public service over 50 years ago when 
there was a conscience of paying the bill for the Government we 
provided. I will never forget, one of the first measures we had come 
before us was a veterans' bonus for the World War II veterans. I can 
see Julian Dusenberry, a Member from Florence, whose legs had been shot 
out from under him. He was a Distinguished Service Cross recipient. He 
raised himself up on those brass bars we had at the back of the Chamber 
for him, and he said: Mr. Speaker, we all are veterans, but we are all 
South Carolinians. South Carolina doesn't have the money, and I move to 
table the bill. And we killed the veterans' bonus.
  It was shortly thereafter that I could see we were not providing 
public education in a general sense for all of our constituency. More 
particularly, there were just absolutely no schools for African 
Americans. I went to one shortly after I was elected. It was a one-
square building, one floor. It was a cold November day. They had a 
potbellied stove in the middle, a class in one corner, a class in 
another corner, a class in the third corner, and a class in the fourth 
corner. This African American school had one teacher for the four 
classes. So I introduced the sales tax to pay for education. It was a 3 
percent sales tax, and we finally enacted it in 1951. It was quite a 
struggle, but nobody has really contested that measure, nor has anyone 
put in a bill to repeal it.
  We have to pay for the public schools. Under Governor Riley--he was 
Secretary of Education--we increased that from 3 to 5 percent.
  When I came in as Governor of South Carolina, some 40 years ago, we 
had to attract industry. Everybody was looking for jobs. I am sort of 
an expert at looking for jobs. I traveled the highways and byways, but 
before I did that, I prepared myself to sell the point. I knew they 
were not going to invest in South Carolina, unless we had a pay-as-you-
go operation. So I moved to increase taxes and got the AAA credit 
rating for the State of South Carolina back in 1959, before any 
Southern State, including the State of Virginia, had a AAA credit 
rating.
  I address the distinguished Chair because he gave real leadership to 
his State of Virginia when he was Governor. He knows exactly what we 
are talking about. In fact, the gentleman we had in South Carolina went 
back up to Richmond, VA, to help in industrial expansion. So we worked 
together trying to develop public education, strong communities, and 
fiscal responsibility at the State level. But you can come up here to 
Washington and you can forget about it.
  I saw one article the other day that was put in the Record relative 
to President Lyndon Baines Johnson. It said he didn't care. Oh, no, he 
did. He didn't give us guns and butter. He paid in 1968 and 1969 for 
the Vietnam War. The last time your U.S. Government balanced the budget 
was under President Lyndon Baines Johnson in 1968-1969. We ended up in 
the black with a surplus. Thereafter, as chairman of the Budget 
Committee under President Carter I can tell you, we still had a 
conscience.
  I will never forget that 1980 election. They cleaned out Democrats. I 
went to the ones who were cleaned out and said: Look, you have to give 
me a vote. We can't leave this year with a deficit bigger than the one 
we inherited from President Ford. I went to Senator Magnuson, I went to 
Senator Church, I went to Senator Culver, I went to Senator McGovern, I 
went to Senator Bayh, I went to Senator Gaylord Nelson--all defeated in 
1980. I said: You have to give me one vote. They did, and we reduced 
that deficit.
  Then, of course, when President Reagan came in with voodoo, which 
Vice President Bush called it, the idea is to cut your taxes and that 
will increase your revenue. That is absolute nonsense. We know now from 
voodoo 1, 2, 3, and 4 that we are in the worst trouble we have ever 
been. That is why I take the floor today to speak generally with 
respect to taxes.
  All politicians are against taxes. In fact, some are so adamant 
against them, they run against the Government, they run against the job 
they are running for. But taxes are what we pay for a civilized 
society, said Oliver Wendell Holmes.
  Let's try, Mr. President, a nation without taxes, just momentarily. 
Let's agree, for example, to not touch Social Security and Medicare--
they are both in surplus. In fact, everybody wants to save Social 
Security. If you just left it alone and quit spending the Social 
Security revenues on any and everything but Social Security, you would 
have a $1.5 trillion surplus in the Social Security trust fund, which 
the Greenspan Commission called for and which we passed in law, section 
13-301 of the Budget Act, that we totally ignore now. So let's leave 
Social Security, Medicare, and Defense alone.
  But let's take all the other things government does with taxpayer 
dollars and get rid of them so we can get rid of taxes. The Departments 
of State, Justice, Commerce, and Education would immediately be 
abolished. We would eliminate the FBI.
  We would stop building roads or fixing the ones we have. We would do 
away with the hospitals receiving Federal support, eliminate the 
National Institutes of Health, and close all the Veterans Hospitals.
  We would close the monuments and the parks, decertify the food 
certified by the Food and Drug Administration, decertify the drugs for 
the same reason, eliminate all the farm programs. When one mentions 
farm programs, they can get some attention in this body. That is the 
crowd that does not want to pay for anything, but they wiggle their way 
in and walk away with billions every time, every session. They always 
get billions, but let's do away with the farm programs, eliminate the 
development programs, forget about clean air, clean water, just close 
the Environmental Protection Administration; cancel NOAA, cancel NASA, 
cancel the housing programs, close the airports because they are 
supported by Federal taxes.
  In fact, just close the prisons. Tell all the prisoners, sooey, pig, 
just get out. Just shoo, get out. Get rid of the President, get rid of 
the Congress, the Cabinet, the courts. Just get rid of the government.
  I talked to a group in South Carolina and finally got their attention 
that we are lucky to be born in America where there is a government 
supported by the taxes that helps provide our opportunities. For 
example, someone born in Zambia can expect to live to only 37 years of 
age; born in Swaziland, 38 years; born in Rwanda, 39 years; Mozambique, 
40 years; Niger, where someone found yellow cake, he lives to be 41 
years of age. If I had been born in Niger, I would have been dead 
already for 40 years. I do not want to give that idea out to a lot of 
people listening to what I am talking about.
  Eighty percent of those born today in rural India have worms. Eighty-
five percent will go hungry and 95 percent in rural India will drink 
dirty water all of their lives. One born today in Botswana has a one in 
three chance of getting AIDS, and someone born in Mali instead of the 
United States has only a 10-percent chance of completing the first 
grade. One born in Brazil has a 40-percent chance of dropping out of 
school by the sixth grade. A girl born in Pakistan has less than a 10-
percent chance of attending high school. In Senegal one has only a 50-
percent chance of finding a job.
  In Sri Lanka, one can expect to earn only 40 cents an hour; Haiti, 30 
cents an

[[Page 21972]]

hour; Bangladesh, 20 cents an hour. So one born in many countries 
instead of the good old USA, they cannot vote, they have no labor 
rights, they cannot even assemble.
  We all like to think, wait a minute now, we all came up by our own 
bootstraps; that we did it on our own. No. If one is born in America, 
the government has furnished the boot. The government in America has 
furnished the law and order, educational opportunity, a market economy, 
clean air, clean water, civil rights, labor rights, a free society. 
Born in America, as Thomas Wolfe wrote, each has his own shining golden 
opportunity.
  Because of this land of opportunity, supported by taxes, Asians come 
hidden in containers on ships, and Mexican immigrants risk their lives 
every day to get here.
  Some will say we do not need the taxes. What we need is spending 
cuts. I say to my dear colleagues, spending cuts will not do it. I 
think that is the thrust of the point that I hope sobers this crowd up. 
It worries them, as it worries me. Even if Congress eliminated every 
nondefense Government program, it would not get us out of the deficit 
hole.
  Every American should refer to page 8 of the Congressional Budget 
Office Budget and Economic Outlook Update. I ask unanimous consent that 
page 8 and page 10 be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                     TABLE 1-3.--CBO'S PROJECTIONS OF DISCRETIONARY SPENDING AND HOMELAND SECURITY SPENDING
                                                                                    [In billions of dollars]
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                                                                                              Total,     Total,
                                                                2003      2004      2005      2006      2007      2008      2009      2010      2011      2012      2013    2004-2008  2004-2013
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                        TOTAL DISCRETIONARY SPENDING IN CBO'S BASELINE\1\
 
Budget Authority:
    Defense.................................................       455       465       476       488       500       514       527       541       556       571       587      2,442      5,226
    Nondefense..............................................       391       407       416       427       437       449       462       474       487       500       514      2,136      4,573
                                                             -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total.............................................       846       872       892       914       938       963       989     1,015     1,044     1,071     1,101      4,579      9,799
Outlays:
    Defense.................................................       407       452       472       481       489       506       519       533       552       558       578      2,400      5,140
    Nondefense..............................................       419       448       460       467       479       491       502       515       528       542       556      2,345      4,988
                                                             -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total.............................................       826       900       931       948       969       996     1,022     1,048     1,080     1,100     1,134      4,745     10,128
 
                                                               DISCRETIONARY SPENDING CLASSIFIED AS HOMELAND SECURITY SPENDING\2\
 
Budget Authority:
    Defense.................................................        12        12        12        13        13        13        14        14        14        15        15         63        135
    Nondefense..............................................        26        27        28        29        29        30        31        32        33        34        35        143        309
                                                             -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total.............................................        38        39        40        41        42        44        45        46        47        49        50        206        444
Outlays:
    Defense.................................................        11        12        12        12        13        13        13        14        14        15        15         62        133
    Nondefense..............................................        22        26        27        28        29        30        31        32        33        34        35        141        305
                                                             -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total.............................................        32        38        40        41        42        43        44        46        47        48        50        203        438
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\CBO's baseline assumes that discretionary spending grows at the rate of inflation after 2003. Inflation is projected using the inflators specified in the Balanced Budget and Emergency
  Deficit Control Act of 1985 (the GDP deflator and the employment cost index for wages and salaries).
\2\This classification includes much of the funding associated with the Department of Homeland Security, as well as funding for homeland security activities performed by other federal
  agencies, such as the Departments of Justice, Health and Human Services, and Energy. Funding for certain activities of the Department of Homeland Security, such as maritime safety and
  immigration services, is not included because those activities are not part of the Administration's definition of homeland security. For a complete discussion of the Administration's
  definition of homeland security, see Office of Management and Budget, Annual Report to Congress on Combating Terrorism (June 2002), available at www.whitehouse.gov/omb/legislative/
combating_terrorism06-2002.pdf. In addition, the Administration's definition includes roughly $1 billion of mandatory spending each year.
 
Source: Congressional Budget Office.
Note: Discretionary outlays are usually higher than budget authority because of spending from the Highway Trust Fund and the Airport and Airway Trust Fund, which is subject to obligation
  limitations set in appropriation acts. The budget authority for such programs is provided in authorizing legislation and is not considered discretionary.


                                                               TABLE 1-5.--CBO'S BASELINE PROJECTIONS OF FEDERAL INTEREST AND DEBT
                                                                                    [In billions of dollars]
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                Actual                                                                                                        Total,     Total,
                                                                 2002      2003     2004     2005     2006     2007     2008     2009     2010     2011     2012     2013   2004-2008  2004-2013
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                      NET INTEREST OUTLAYS
 
Interest on the Public Debt (Gross interest)\1\..............       333      322      318      356      409      463      510      549      583      611      633      647      2,057      5,080
Interest Received by Trust Funds:
    Social Security..........................................       -77      -84      -87      -93     -102     -114     -128     -142     -157     -173     -190     -208       -524     -1,395
    Other trust funds\2\.....................................       -76      -73      -66      -69      -74      -78      -82      -87      -91      -96     -101     -106       -369       -848
                                                              ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Subtotal...........................................      -153     -157     -153     -162     -176     -192     -210     -229     -248     -269     -291     -314       -893     -2,244
Other Interest\3\............................................        -8       -8      -10      -11      -13      -15      -17      -19      -21      -23      -25      -28        -65       -182
Other Investment Income\4\...................................         0      (*)      (*)       -1       -1       -1       -1       -1       -1       -1       -1       -1         -3         -7
                                                              ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total (Net interest)...............................       171      157      155      184      220      255      282      301      312      318      316      305      1,096      2,648
 
                                                                                  FEDERAL DEBT (AT END OF YEAR)
 
Debt Held by the Public......................................     3,540    3,986    4,443    4,790    5,027    5,242    5,450    5,631    5,784    5,800    5,645    5,438       n.a.       n.a.
Debt Held by Government Accounts:
    Social Security..........................................     1,329    1,486    1,650    1,828    2,025    2,241    2,475    2,727    2,996    3,281    3,580    3,891       n.a.       n.a.
    Other government accounts\2\.............................     1,329    1,367    1,436    1,523    1,627    1,739    1,856    1,978    2,104    2,235    2,373    2,513       n.a.       n.a.
                                                              ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Total..............................................     2,658    2,852    3,085    3,352    3,653    3,980    4,331    4,705    5,100    5,516    5,953    6,404       n.a.       n.a.
Gross Federal Debt...........................................     6,198    6,838    7,528    8,142    8,679    9,222    9,782   10,335   19,774   11,316   11,598   11,842       n.a.       n.a.
Debt Subject to Limit\5\.....................................     6,161    6,801    7,491    8,105    8,642    9,185    9,744   10,297   10,845   11,277   11,599   11,803       n.a.       n.a.
 
                                                                               FEDERAL DEBT AS A PERCENTAGE OF GDP
 
Debt Held by the Public......................................      34.2     37.1     39.5     40.4     40.1     39.7     39.2     38.5     37.6     36.0     33.4     30.7       n.a.       n.a.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\Excludes interest costs of debt issued by agencies other than the Treasury (primarily the Tennessee Valley Authority).
\2\Principally Civil Service Retirement, Military Retirement, Medicare, and Unemployment Insurance.
\3\Primarily interest on loans to the public.
\4\Earnings on private investments by the Railroad Retirement Board.
\5\Differs from gross federal debt primarily because most debt issued by agencies other than the Treasury is excluded from the debt limit. The current debt limit is $7,384 billion.
 
Source: Congressional Budget Office.
Note: * = between -$500 million and zero; n.a. = not applicable.

  Mr. HOLLINGS. If we turn to page 8, we will see that nondefense 
outlays for this particular fiscal year that we are in is 419 billion 
bucks. But if we turn to page 10, we will see that the deficit for this 
fiscal year is $640 billion. So do not

[[Page 21973]]

just cut. Eliminate all nondefense programs, eliminate all those 
departments, prisons, the FBI, the Congress, the courts, the President. 
Just eliminate everything. Get rid of it. And we still have a $200 
billion dollar or more deficit.
  So do not come around in these debates and give these nice, pleasant, 
Chamber of Commerce, Rotary Club talks that what we really need in 
Washington is to cut down the spending, cut down the size of 
Government, Government is just too big.
  Well, by gosh, come on up here and just cut it out, and there is 
still a deficit. So we have over a $200 billion deficit right there and 
then, and now comes President Bush who says he needs $87 billion--like 
we have some money. We are just nothing but wallowing around in the red 
using credit cards, and so he asks that the Congress provide $87 
billion more for Iraq. Of course, that is all on the credit card 
further, a bigger deficit. It is really a sin and a shame.
  What we are saying is, me and my generation and most of the 
generations of the Members that I see and who can speak this evening 
say we ain't going to pay the bill. We do not want that GI in downtown 
Baghdad to get killed. We want him to rush back to pay the bill because 
we ain't going to pay for it. We need a tax cut so next year we can get 
reelected. That is the message of everybody running around with flags 
on their lapels showing how they support the troops.
  Well, come on. Support the troops? When are they going to cosponsor 
my value-added tax? I tried it with the value-added tax after we failed 
with Gramm-Rudman-Hollings. We worked with President Reagan in a 
bipartisan fashion and we did a good job momentarily for 2 or 3 years, 
but then instead of using Gramm-Rudman-Hollings to cut back some $35 
billion in spending each and every year, we were using it as a cover to 
increase spending $35 billion each and every year.
  So I said give me a divorce from that. I don't want my name connected 
with it. I got hold of Dick Darman, when President George Herbert 
Walker Bush, the senior Bush, took office. Darman was the OMB Director.
  I said: Dick, we ought to have a value-added tax.
  They discussed it. I got a little note from Papa Bush to the effect 
that he might consider that but not right now, his first year in 
office.
  We tried and tried until we got to President Clinton. Then we had a 
showdown on how to act responsibly. Without a single Republican vote in 
the House, without a single Republican vote in the Senate, President 
Clinton and this Democratic Congress passed an increase in taxes as 
well as spending cuts. We cut some $350 billion to $400 billion in 
spending, but we increased taxes on the high and wealthy. We increased 
the income taxes. We increased gasoline taxes. We increased Social 
Security taxes.
  I will never forget the distinguished Senator from Texas, Mr. Phil 
Gramm, saying they were going to be hunting down the Democrats in the 
streets and shooting us like dogs when they found out we were, by gosh, 
going to increase taxes on Social Security.
  But you see now that rich crowd comes in, and what they want and all 
they ask for is: Give me an income tax cut. Give me a retroactive one, 
nunc pro tunc. They sneaked in all kinds of things for Kenny Boy Lay. 
It came to $250 million. I have never seen such things.
  Then they wanted to get rid of the taxes on dividends. I want the 
party of Lincoln to remember that Abraham Lincoln put a tax on 
dividends to pay for the Civil War. He was willing to pay for the war. 
We have paid for every war, until now.
  Let me be brief here because I can see the hour is getting late. 
Rather than going into this very interesting article by the former 
Secretary of Labor, Dr. Robert B. Reich, printed in USA Today entitled 
``Tax wealthy to pay for Iraq war,'' I ask unanimous consent to have 
that article printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                    [From USA Today, Sept. 15, 2003]

                    Tax Wealthy To Pay for Iraq War


                    test patriotism's deeper meaning

                          (By Robert B. Reich)

       President Bush says he will ask Congress for $87 billion in 
     emergency spending for military and intelligence operations 
     in Iran and Afghanistan. That's on top of the $79 billion 
     Congress already has approved to pay for the war and its 
     immediate aftermath. Neither of these figures includes an 
     estimated $50 billion more that will be needed to rebuild 
     Iraq, or any additional expenditures we may need for homeland 
     security.
       How can we afford all that?
       The coming fiscal year's federal budget deficit already is 
     approaching $600 billion. Add in the extra spending, and it's 
     close to $600 billion. And that's just one year's tab. The 
     total over all the years it will take to stabilize both Iraq 
     and Afghanistan and win the war against terrorism is likely 
     to be far higher.
       Bush and the Republican Congress have no real plan to pay 
     for these extra costs. At one time they mentioned Iraq oil, 
     but the oil won't be flowing in substantial volume until 
     wells and pipelines are rebuilt, which could take years. 
     America's major allies haven't offered to foot the bill. 
     Given that France and Germany are still grumpy about the 
     Iraqi war, and Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair is taking 
     a great deal of heat about it at home, there's no reason to 
     suppose that they will be offering a lot of financial help.
       One thing is certain. Neither the White House nor Congress 
     is considering the best solution: a year tax on wealthy. 
     Raising taxes is politically unpopular. Bush has wanted only 
     to cut taxes, especially on America's wealth. Yet there's a 
     strong history of conservatives and Republicans who have 
     embraced war taxes as the fairest and best way to finance the 
     costs.
       Traditionally during wartime, taxes have been raised on top 
     incomes to pay the extra costs of war. The estate tax--
     overwhelmingly paid by wealthy families--was imposed by 
     wartime Republican presidents Abraham Lincoln and William 
     McKinley. It was maintained through World War I, World War 
     II, the Korean War, Vietnam and the Cold War. Now, the estate 
     tax is being phased out, at least until 2011, as part of the 
     tax cut of 2001.
       The top income tax rate rose during World War I to 70 
     percent. In World War II, it reached more than 90 percent. In 
     1953, with the Cold War raging, Republican President Dwight 
     Eisenhower refused to support a Republican move to reduce it. 
     By 1980, it was still way up there, at 70 percent. Then 
     Ronald Reagan slashed it to 28 percent, giving us the lowest 
     top tax rate of all modern industrialized nations. Because 
     Reagan kept spending record sums on the military, the federal 
     deficit ballooned. A few years after that, the Berlin Wall 
     came down, ending the Cold War. We congratulated ourselves 
     and then faced the largest budget deficit since World War II.
       It seems only fair that the rich should pay proportionately 
     more, especially now that the cost of the war against 
     terrorism is rising. They're the only ones with money to 
     spare. Look at the numbers: In 1979, the top 5 percent of 
     earners took home 16.4 percent of total family income, but by 
     2001, their share had increased to 22.4 percent. In contrast, 
     in 1979 the bottom 60 percent of earners took home 31.4 
     percent of total income; by 2001 their share had declined to 
     26.8 percent.
       Besides, the very richest Americans benefit 
     disproportionately from a stable federal government that 
     protects their property and maintains public tranquility.
       President Teddy Roosevelt made that case in 1906, arguing 
     that the wartime inheritance tax should continue during 
     peacetime: ``The man of great wealth owes a particular 
     obligation to the state because he derives special advantages 
     from the mere existence of government.''
       It is the least the wealthy can do when so many others are 
     sacrificing for the nation. Most wealthy kids never come near 
     a front line. During the first Gulf War, enlistment rates for 
     children of the richest 15 percent were one-fifth of the 
     national average. Charles Moskos, a sociology professor at 
     Northwestern University and expert on military affairs, notes 
     that in his 1956 Princeton class, 450 of 750 men served in 
     the military. In those days, America still had a draft. Last 
     year, only three of Princeton's 1,000 graduates served.
       The Bush administration doesn't seem interested in a war 
     tax on the wealthy. To the contrary, the White House has been 
     busily shifting the tax burden away from the rich--phasing 
     out the estate tax, cutting taxes on dividends and parceling 
     out other tax breaks to them. The president says this is the 
     way to stimulate a sluggish economy. But the rich aren't 
     going to spend the extra cash. They already spend as much as 
     they want. They're more likely to invest it around the world, 
     wherever they can get the highest return. Repealing a year's 
     tax cut for the top 1 percent would generate almost enough to 
     cover the entire $87 billion of additional spending on Iraq.
       A war tax, properly structured, also would prevent the rich 
     from squirreling away their income in foreign tax shelters. 
     An acquaintance from law school, now a partner in one

[[Page 21974]]

     of Washington's biggest firms, with offices in many 
     countries, recently explained to me one such dodge as we 
     lunched in a swanky restaurant. He and his partners use tax 
     rules to create offsetting taxable gains and losses, then 
     allocate the gains to the firm's foreign partners, who don't 
     pay taxes in the United States. That way, they keep the 
     losses in the United States and shelter their income abroad. 
     A war tax, properly structured, would close such foreign 
     loopholes.
       I noted he had an American flag lapel pin. ``You're 
     supporting our troops,'' I said, referring to it. ``Yup,'' he 
     replied, entirely missing my point. ``And I can't stand all 
     those naysayers who are knocking America. I mean, we stand or 
     fall together, right?''
       Exactly. Suggesting that the wealthy should pay more to 
     support the nation in time of war isn't inviting class 
     warfare. It's exploring a deeper meaning of patriotism. The 
     basic question is what we own one another as citizens. The 
     question seems especially pertinent in a newly dangerous 
     world, in which we stand or fall together.

  Mr. HOLLINGS. Secretary Reich, he wants to tax the 1 percent most 
wealthy. He says that will get us $87 billion.
  I am for doing away with all of President Bush's tax cuts so we can 
get jobs and the economy going, as we did under President Clinton. When 
we passed that, back in 1993, we had 8 years of the finest economic 
growth that you have ever seen. We put the Government back in the 
black, and we did it by increasing taxes. Now they say to put it back 
in the black, give the rich a tax cut.

                          ____________________