Bush promised, "I came to this office to solve problems and not pass them on to future presidents and future generations."
Yet as a direct consequence of his tax policy, over six years an American family of four will take on $52,000 more in its share of the national debt. That’s the Bush Tax.
The Bush Tax is huge — many times greater than most people’s tax refunds. We’ll be paying the Bush Tax for decades, and so will our children and grandchildren. ... |
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"I came to this office to solve problems and not pass them on to future presidents and future generations." —George W. BushAssociated Press
Dec. 2, 2003
Whippany, NJ — President Bush made a fund-raising stop in New Jersey yesterday, speaking for 20 minutes to a crowd of about 500 party faithful at a $2,000-a-plate evening fund-raiser.
Not breaking any new ground, Bush, speaking in the main ballroom of the Hanover Marriott in Whippany, highlighted the accomplishments of his administration, including eliminating the terrorism threat from Afghanistan and weapons of mass destruction from Iraq and ensuring that Medicare will remain solvent.
"I came to this office to solve problems and not pass them on to future presidents and future generations," Bush told the crowd.
Bush was introduced by former New Jersey Gov. Christie Whitman, and, during his remarks, referred to her as chairwoman of the New Jersey Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. Bush thanked Whitman, who resigned in May as head of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, and Republican fund-raiser Lewis Eisenberg, who will co-chair the campaign.
Whitman said an official announcement on the state's re-election team will happen around Christmas, but "the president leaked it."
Dispelling speculation that her resignation from the EPA was the result of a policy rift with the president, Whitman said, "The president and I have never had a problem. We work well together. We trust each other."
Whitman said Eisenberg will "be doing the heavy lifting, serving as campaign-finance chair."
To be sure, there are pockets of New Jersey where wealthy Republican donors can be counted on, particularly the "wealth belt" of Hunterdon, Somerset and Morris counties, said James W. Hughes, dean of the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University.
Morris County is also the county Bush won by the biggest vote margin — 111,066 to 88,039 — over Democrat Al Gore in 2000.
"He can't afford not to tap into it," Hughes said of the state's rich donor pool.
But overall, Gore trounced Bush in New Jersey, and Bush's reception by Democrats and other groups yesterday was no friendlier.
Members of the state's Democratic congressional delegation stood on the Statehouse steps in Trenton and blasted the president for the recent Medicare overhaul.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., said more than 90,000 New Jersey retirees would lose prescription benefits now paid by their former employers, and that Bush "is leaving our senior citizens behind."
Members of NJ Peace Action, a group that has opposed the war in Iraq, demonstrated outside the hotel in Whippany, as did American Atheists, a national group headquartered in Cranford that opposes Bush's faith-based initiatives. Members of the New Jersey chapter of the National Organization for Women joined in the protest.
About 75 demonstrators awaited the president's arrival in a parking lot holding area several hundred feet from the hotel entrance.
"If we were where we wanted to be, we'd be in the lobby," said Susan Waldman, vice president of the Morris County NOW chapter. NOW opposes the president's position on the late-term abortion procedure opponents call "partial-birth abortion," the war in Iraq and the recently enacted Medicare reform bill.
Bush has even had trouble from his own appointees from New Jersey. Whitman resigned as EPA chief after differing with the administration on issues of climate change, drinking-water standards and air pollution.
Another former Republican governor, Thomas H. Kean, appointed co-chairman of a commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack, has accused the government of resisting requests for information.
David Rebovich, a Rider University political scientist, said the devastating impact of the Sept. 11 attack on New Jersey, and the state's dependence on market fluctuations, mean the Garden State could still be fertile soil for Bush in terms of more than just fund-raising.
"It doesn't hurt Bush that the economy has bounced back, that he had this positive appearance in Iraq," Rebovich said. "It may not be bad idea to visit a state like New Jersey."
Published by
Associated Press
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