Replies

Then let him know it. I sent him what I posted up top.

Sen David Fowler
sen.david.fowler@legislature.state.tn.us

Believe me, they hear from me quite often. They probably have have their e-mail set up to automatically send my letters to the trash as I don't hold back.

Oh and I see they put in a "poison pill" to impose a flat income tax once the voters rejected increasing sales taxes. How stupid do they think Tennesseans are?? Time to bring the crowds back to the State Legislature to demand a simple straight up and down vote on new taxes!!!

Fowler's lame excuse.

Three years ago, I was one of the seven state senators who sponsored the resolution that abruptly adjourned the first special session when the talk turned to an income tax. The next year, I filed and argued for 90 amendments to cut the budget. Only 102 were filed, so basically 90% of them were mine. Others who only talk about cutting the budget were unwilling to file such amendments because they didn't want to risk irritating the special interests and groups that would be affected. Last year I worked with Senator Norris and co-sponsored with him more budget cut amendments. In other words, in the last two years I have filed more amendments to cut the budget than all my colleagues combined. I also filed and argued two comprehesive proposals to overhaul TennCare complete with the financial data to support them and even went to the trouble to fly in Richard Teske, a leading adivsor to governments on overhauling medicaid who worked with President Reagan for 7 years as the White House liason to HCFA. None of those efforts got anywhere.

Conservatives are not the political majority in this legislature and we must have a budget and it must be balanced. We cannot even fund last year's budget without an additional $775 million in new funds beacuse last year's budget was balanced using One time tobacco money. That is why, unlike many of my "conservative" friends, I did not vote for last year's budget - it was an instrument of deficit spending like Washington. Now it has come home to bite us. Those are real facts, in the record, about what I have tried to do to haul in spending. We can no longer just sit on our butts and do nothing because we have to have a budget and it must be balanced. I'd suggest that our citizenry send up a little support for the amendments I've filed and my TennCare reform proposals.

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My response: Then why are you calling for more taxes now? As I understand it, your proposal would either take from us more sales taxes or an income tax. The tax stops here.