Word: btu
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Such old-fashioned politicking, quietly replayed across a belt of carefully chosen Western and Midwestern cities and towns this spring, finally caught up last week with Clinton's new-fashioned energy tax. The well-organized lobbying buried the $72 billion BTU levy that was the centerpiece of the President's deficit-reduction plan. A chastened Clinton pulled back from the bruising fight and left the Senate Finance Committee to wrangle over a replacement plan that included some combination of a gasoline tax and cuts in Medicare. The negotiations will be tense as the committee struggles to meet its deadline this...
...failure of the BTU tax, Clinton is simply reaping what he has been sowing ever since he unveiled his economic plan in February. Clinton undercut his claim that all Americans would sacrifice equally. He granted a steady string of energy-tax exemptions to key lawmakers, special pleaders and important industries. Farmers won exemptions on diesel fuel for tractors. Majority Leader George Mitchell won an exemption for home heating oil, an important commodity in New England. Clinton himself agreed in an April telephone call (from a Congressman at a pay phone in Oklahoma) to change the way the tax would...
...McLarty worked steadily behind the scenes last week to keep Louisiana Senator John Breaux quiet about his objections to the energy tax until the House vote was safely over. But eventually they realized they might do better enlisting the Senator to help broker a compromise to lessen the BTU tax's impact. Officials said House members' reservations would be taken into account when the Senate marks up its measure...
...Maine -- unveiled a plan of their own. The so- called Boren-Danforth amendment features lower taxes and more spending cuts than the President's proposal, as well as a cap on entitlements spending. The Boren-Danforth bill would also completely eliminate Clinton's energy levy -- the so-called BTU tax. Altogether, the plan would raise taxes $122 billion less than Clinton's proposal and would cut spending $163 billion more. Over five years, it would reduce the deficit $542 billion, compared with $496 billion under the Administration's plan...
...Senate Finance Committee: "The Boren-Danforth amendment will never make it out of the Finance Committee." What it could do, however, is be a starting point for negotiations. One possible compromise would be to substitute a gasoline tax -- unpopular as that would be in the West -- for a BTU tax. In any case, Boren predicted last week that "the BTU tax is dead...