Sixth tax cut in five years ... and ... toughest test of fiscal austerity in nearly a decade

Critical Votes Loom For Hill Republicans: "Party to Set Cuts to Entitlement Spending | By Jonathan Weisman | Washington Post Staff Writer | Sunday, August 28, 2005; A04
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The raft of bills, due out of 16 committees in the House and Senate by Sept. 16, will present the Republican Party its toughest test of fiscal austerity in nearly a decade.
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The impact of the bills will be broad:

· The energy committees will produce legislation to open Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling to secure $2.4 billion in royalties and other payments.

· The Senate Finance Committee is trying to find as much as $10 billion in savings from Medicaid, trimming anticipated growth by as much as 13 percent at a time when states such as Tennessee and Missouri are throwing tens of thousands of people off their Medicaid rosters.

· The Senate agriculture committee will try to trim farm price supports by $2.4 billion through 2010 while cutting an additional $600 million from food stamps.

· Senate aides are crafting legislation to cut $7 billion from the federal student loan program.

· The House and Senate education and labor committees are expected to draft legislation to raise the premiums corporations pay to the troubled Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. from $16 to $31 per worker, a move that would improve the government's balance sheet by $6.5 billion.
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Democrats intend to make the Republicans squirm, especially since the sixth tax cut in five years will be moving simultaneously.

"These [spending] cuts are deeply misguided and are only needed to make a partial down payment on the deep tax cuts coming," said Thomas S. Kahn, Democratic staff director of the House Budget Committee.

The cost of the tax cut measure must total $70 billion. But Grassley hopes to craft legislation that would cut taxes by $90 billion over five years, while closing enough tax loopholes to bring the net cost down to the $70 billion price tag that can pass the Senate without a filibuster. ...