There are very few Republicans in Congress who actually care about the national debt. Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma is one of them. The way to spot a “serious deficit hawk” in a crowd of “unserious deficit hawks” is to take a close look at their position on tax increases.
Coburn, as one of the “Gang of Six” (a number far too small to be of any real influence in a congressional debate) has said that everything is on the table, including tax hikes, to get the deficit under control. Unserious proposals, like House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wisc.), which includes massive tax cuts for top-earners, may play better to the base, but they don’t stand a chance of actually being passed in the Senate or signed by the President.
Now Coburn has taken the debate to the anti-tax evangelists. Speaking of anti-tax crusader, Grover Norquist, Coburn declared that the pledge to the American people is more important than the famed no-new-taxes pledge many Republican lawmakers have made to Norquist:
“Where’s the compromise that will save our country?” he asked. “This isn’t about politics that is normal.”
This is a welcome sign from Coburn, who has also had good things to say about defense cuts – the sacred cow of big government spending on the right, including calling for a much-needed audit of the Pentagon.
In any case, it’s no surprise that Grover Norquist has quickly shot back at Coburn, claiming that he lied his way into office:
Coburn said on national TV today that he lied his way into office and will vote to raise taxes if he damn well feels like it, never mind what he promised the citizens of Oklahoma. Sen. Coburn knows perfectly well that the pledge is not to any organization but to the citizens of his state. He lied to them, not to Americans for Tax Reform.
Before this recent television comment, Coburn told me personally in a phone call that he would not vote for a tax increase and repeated his commitment in writing in a public letter to me.
Of course, this is nonsense. Coburn, like every other conservative, campaigned against tax hikes in 2004 and signed pledge saying so. But in 2004 we had not experienced the budget-busting economic collapse of 2008. In 2004 there was no way to predict the dire straits that the federal budget would be in just a few years later, though it is passing strange that anyone believed we could pay for two concurrent wars without hiking taxes on the American people.
