Bush Attacks Clinton’s Record on Taxes

President Bush released the second television ad of his general election campaign Wednesday, an attack on Bill Clinton’s record on taxes.

Although Bush aides refused to disclose where the ad is running, independent research suggests that it is being broadcast in Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

The Ad: “To pay for his increased spending in Arkansas, Bill Clinton raised state taxes. And not just on the rich,� a narrator says with obvious sarcasm. “He increased the sales tax by 33%. Imposed a mobile home tax. Increased the beer tax. He assessed a tourism tax. Created a cable TV tax. Supported a tax on groceries.�

Images of mobile homes, groceries, tourists and Clinton playing the saxophone are intercut with pictures of a smiling Clinton surrounded by applauding Arkansas lawmakers and aides. The images of Clinton are played at high speed to make them look humorous, and they suggest that every time Clinton and his friends raised taxes, they enjoyed it.

“And now, if elected President, Bill Clinton has promised to increase government spending $220 billion,� the ad concludes. “Guess where he’ll get the money?�

Analysis: The ad, which Bush aides says uses humor so that viewers would be more likely to remember it, is technically accurate but frequently misleading. For instance, it leaves the impression that Clinton raised spending in a way a Republican Administration never would. But since 1983, while state spending in Arkansas rose by 89%, federal spending increased by 88%.

Another example involves the 33% sales tax increase in Arkansas. Clinton raised the state sales tax from 3% to 4.5% over the last decade, a 33% increase on a smaller-than-usual base. And he coupled that increase with an income tax reduction for more than 40% of state residents. Although Clinton raised the beer tax during the 1980s, so did Bush in 1990.

The grocery tax that the ad faults Clinton for supporting was in place before he took office, and he proposed rebating it to lower-income residents. The Legislature balked at that suggestion.

Overall, the ad seeks to leave the impression that the answer to the concluding question is that the middle and lower classes would finance much of Clinton’s new spending proposals. In fact, he has said he would get $92 billion through higher income taxes on households making more than $200,000 a year, and $58 billion in higher corporate taxes.