Word: democratic
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...years of paying lip service to balanced budgets while racking up annual deficits approaching $200 billion, Congress and the White House have finally decided to fit themselves with a fiscal straitjacket. The bill, sponsored by Senate Republicans Phil Gramm of Texas and Warren Rudman of New Hampshire and by Democrat Fritz Hollings of South Carolina, compels Congress to vote to balance the budget within five years or face automatic cuts. "What % this bill does is put the fat in the fire," declared Gramm. "It forces decisions." Senator J. Bennett Johnston of Louisiana, however, likened Congressmen voting for the bill...
...Government by Veg-O-Matic," declared Chris Matthews, a top aide to House Speaker Tip O'Neill, sardonically referring to the kitchen device once hawked on late-night TV ("It slices! It dices! It really, really works!"). On the floor, some prominent legislators were scornful. Gramm-Rudman, huffed Wisconsin Democrat Les Aspin, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, "is just about the dumbest piece of legislation I have seen in my 15 years on Capitol Hill." O'Neill himself warned, "Wait until you get to 1987 and have to cut $55 billion. Wait until you hear the American people...
...push tax reform through the Democrat-controlled House, the President had taken a calculated gamble and formed an unholy alliance with Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, a bluff old-style Democratic pol. Though studded with deals and concessions to buy off various Congressmen and their constituencies, the tax package Rostenkowski wrung out of his committee last month was at least a reasonable facsimile of the reform proposal launched by Reagan with great fanfare last spring. Beset by conflicting advice from his aides, however, the President hesitated before endorsing Rostenkowski's bill two weeks ago, and even then his praise...
...patient is on the table, dying but not yet dead," said a dejected Richard Gephardt, the Missouri Democrat who has made tax reform his major cause. But Reagan, who grew increasingly angry as he mulled over the G.O.P. defections, ordered his lieutenants to try to revive the moribund bill last week. Said Treasury Secretary James Baker as he headed off to Capitol Hill to cajole and arm-twist, "It ain't over till it's over...
Ferraro's finances, which bedeviled her 1984 campaign, were not her only political liability. Alfonse D'Amato, who squeaked into office five years ago in a three-way contest, has confounded Democrats by building a formidable base for a second-term bid. A tireless campaigner who tends assiduously to home- state details, D'Amato has amassed a war chest of $7 million. Last week, even though the Democrats have yet to come up with a candidate, five New York City unions, including those representing city employees and transit workers, endorsed D'Amato, bringing his statewide total to nearly 70. Even...