The Media's role: (late January email)

    The Oregonian (1-29) advocates building a "rainy day" fund exclusively by imposing of a new tax designed especially for that purpose -- confiscating the
tax rebate ("kicker") due from overtaxing corporations doing business in 
Oregon.  Thus the legislature will not have to suspend its practice of spending
every last dime of the ample tax revenues available, even during this time of 
plenty. Next year the legislature will surely confiscate the kicker rebate due
individual taxpayers, with the Oregonian's blessing.
    What the Oregonian is not telling its readers is that increasing state 
spending at the twenty percent rate recommended by Governor Kulongoski will double state spending in only one decade, and triple the size of our state 
government in just fourteen short years. Oregon taxpayers cannot possibly 
afford to pay for this excessive state spending trajectory, forcing the 
legislature to spend any "rainy day" funds accumulated. So this entire process
is an elaborate ruse, designed to indirectly spend taxpayer tax rebates .
    It is no wonder free-spending Oregon's near-junk bond rating is among the three lowest states in the entire nation (as reported in the Oregonian 1-18) -- ahead of only bankrupt California and Katrina-ravaged Louisiana. The only 
real solution to Oregon's fiscal problems is for the legislature to reduce its 
overly-high level of spending.

The People's Representatives:  (early February email)

   Democrats now control Oregon's government in a time when we have over a $2 billion extra dollars of income tax revenue, and our leaders tell us there is no money to prudently set aside in a "rainy day" fund to use when our booming economy cools? 
    Further, our Governor has proposed collecting even more tax revenue 
from Oregon citizens through a $150 million new tax on cigarettes, a $80 
million new tax on auto insurance, a $40 million increase in the corporate minimum tax, and a $275 million tax repealing the corporate kicker refund. Plus there are supposedly in the works a new $100 million tax on beer and wine, and a new energy tax of $80 million. And yesterday the legislature proposed enacting a new $800 million five percent sales tax on top of all these other taxes. This adds up to over $1.5 billion in new taxes to 
supplement the extra $2 billion already on hand, or $3.5 billion in additional tax revenue to spend. 
    There will probably never be a better time to build the $1 billion rainy day fund the Governor says Oregon desperately need. Yet our political leaders 
have not put forth a tangible plan to save enough tax revenue for even a small part of this fund, other than by confiscating the tax refund due corporations. Sadly, it appears our politicians will never voluntarily restrain their habit of spending every last dollar available, and then raising our taxes to spend even more. And Oregon taxpayers will be hard pressed to dig their way out of the spending spree instituted by this Democrat-controlled legislature.

Ross Smith
910 SW 68th
Lincoln City, OR 97367