IowaPolitics.com: Huckabee touts 'fair tax' at rally

IowaPolitics.com ^ | 8/2/2007 | Chris Dorsey

[Man50D]

Mike Huckabee is a strong advocate for the "fair tax" proposal, which looks to replace the current tax code with essentially a federal sales and use tax.

The former Arkansas governor and GOP presidential candidate attended a noontime rally in support of the tax proposal Thursday in Grundy Center to share his message that such a proposal is good for the American economy.

"It totally revives the economy," Huckabee said in an interview Thursday with IowaPolitics.com. "It encourages entrepreuneurial efforts to make an economy strong."

Aside from the federal sales tax, the plan also includes a "prebate" to ensure no American pays federal taxes on spending up to the poverty level. The fair tax proposal would benefit the lower one-third of income earners in America, Huckabee said, while forcing the "underground economy" -- composed of criminals and others -- to pay their share of taxes, Huckabee said.

Businesses would also benefit from a fair tax plan, he said. Currently, American businesses are paying $250-$500 billion annually to be tax compliant -- money that could instead go toward research and development, the Republican candidate said.

The fair tax would also eliminate the complicated tax code that is currently in place, Huckabee said.

"It would give us a tax code that a seven-year-old running a lemonade stand could understand," he said.

Lobbyists in Washington, D.C. have kept the proposal from becoming a reality, the former governor said. There are 35,000 lobbyists working 535 members of Congress, and that is keeping the fair tax at bay.

"They like a tax system that has winners and losers," Huckabee said. "The fair tax makes much more sense because it brings sense to the tax code."

[Man50D]

Fair Tax ping!

[ovrtaxt]

Wow, not bad for a guy who has a history of raising taxes.

Good for him!

[kinoxi]

I’d like to see something like this. The current tax code is so complicated that no one person can ‘know it’. If you search for loopholes and workarounds to paying taxes you will find them in most cases, but the time (and effort) to do so is simply not available to most people. It’s a complete mess to try and wade through.

[Sun]

Duncan Hunter is also strongly in favor of FAIR TAX.

I wonder who else is.

[Man50D]

Duncan Hunter is also strongly in favor of FAIR TAX.

I wonder who else is.

Here you go! Presidential candidates

[Mark was here]

The only fair tax is an equal tax, where everyone pays the same amount.

Now if you believe in from each according to his means ... then all sorts of games and percentages come into play to convince the average Joe he is getting a break.

With one set amount the politicians can not divide and conquor the people, like they do when they get non-property owners to vote to raise property taxes, or when they get nonsmokers to raise taxes on cigarettes.

One man, one vote, one tax bill.

[seemoAR]

I don’t think any non-property owning voters ever see a property tax that they will not vote for.

[Principled]

Thanks for posting the “scorecard”.

Seems the frontrunners want to avoid it, but those with everything to gain by taking a risk go for it? Perhaps frontrunners do not want to spend time defending it? That will change when they realize that defending the status quo is impossible and unacceptable.

That will be something to look for a change in. Shoot, I remember when pols hadn’t even heard of any reform!

[nonliberal]

Tancredo is a co-sponsor of the House FairTax bill.

[The Pack Knight]

It's almost frightening just how pervasive the current tax code has become in our daily lives. It's gotten so big that a large part of the electorate treats it like a beaten wife treats her husband. It robs, abuses, and oppresses them at every turn, and yet it is all they know, so they're too afraid to get rid of it for something else.

This is why the top candidates distance themselves from the FairTax. They are too timid to force the voters to face the fears that will go with any radical tax reform proposal. That would require something called "leadership", and I guess we just can't expect that out of our Presidential candidates anymore.

I'm not saying they have to push my preferred proposal, the FairTax, though I would certainly rather they did. The problem is that none of the candidates with a serious chance of being nominated propose any real, specific tax reform. Giuliani and Romney just want to tinker with the current code, get rid of a couple taxes, and lower some marginal rates. McCain claims to be in favor of tax reform, and even said he would sign the FairTax into law, but he couches his support in such vague terms as "anything that would simplify our tax code", and "a flatter and fairer tax", that he really isn't taking a position at all. Even Fred Thompson, my preferred "candidate", is hedging his bets. If he really was answering the FairTax guy in that video, then that's good news, but he's going to have to do better than two words in a flesh-pressing session if he wants to run on tax reform.

And that's really the problem, isn't it? Politicians have become so emasculated by "triangulation" and sound bite politics that they're completely unwilling to tackle such an obvious problem as that monstrosity known as the U.S. Tax Code. The President is supposed to be Leader of the Free World, not Follower of the Fifty-One Percent.

[Principled]

Thanks for your thoughtful post Pack Knight.

I agree with your assertion that front runners are afraid to provide leadership. The situation is changing however.

THe difference[s] visible in the way reform is treated; from no options available [1990?] to several options [all consumption taxes including 2 flat income tax proposals] but still not a word from a pol to two leading proposals mentioned frequently but not debated publicly [nrst hr25 and forbes flat tax] to one leading proposal [hr 25] mentioned frequently in media and by pols and debated in public frequently [but not by front runners].

THe next step will be front runners debating in public frequently instead of sidestepping an issue that requires leadership as you say.

I stand behind my statement that it isn't a matter of if, but a matter of when the nrst becomes law.

We will be forced to expand the base due to entitlement growth. THe sooner we pass the nrst, the better - as it will apply serious brakes to growth of taxation.

[groanup]

Interesting list. Thanks for eliminating some of the candidates for me. The yeses have my vote now.

[groanup]

The income tax code violates the 1st, 5th and 10th amendments.

[The Pack Knight]

I stand behind my statement that it isn't a matter of if, but a matter of when the nrst becomes law.

I certainly agree, and meant to add that myself. If it isn't this election, it'll be the next one, or even the 2010 midterms. When I see Republicans replaced with Democrats because of corruption and spending, and those same Democrats then sporting even lower approval ratings not a year later, it tells me that the electorate might finally be getting sick of how their country is being governed. I think reform in all areas of government will be a winner in coming years, and the tax reform is the most obvious need.

The main obstacle is the fact that it only benefits productive, working Americans, who are rapidly becoming a minority in their own country exactly because of the entitlement and tax growth you mentioned. As productive Americans, we need to realize that it really is our country and ours alone in the end.

[freespirited]

Probably explains why we can’t get rid of it!

[griswold3]

Woo Hoo!!

[Extremely Extreme Extremist]

FairTax won't mean anything unless spending is addressed.

Huckabee's a big government so-con anyway.

[Sun]

Thanks for the link about which presidential candidates are for Fair Tax, and I’m glad to see it’s the majority of GOP presidential candidates, and special kudos to Hunter and Tancredo for co-sponsoring of H.R. 25.

[lewislynn]

Wow, not bad for a guy who has a history of raising taxes.

"those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it,"