Nation & world briefing
Bush: ‘Little bitty’ tax cut just won’t do
Bob Kemper
Chicago Tribune
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (KRT) —
Turning up the pressure on a De
mocratic opponent of his tax cuts,
President Bush on Monday casti
gated Congress for failing to act
fast enough to approve the cuts
that he said are particularly vital
to small-business owners.
“It’s time for them to move,”
Bush told several hundred cheer
ing supporters, chosen by the
Arkansas Republican Party, at a
campaign-style rally.
“The proposal I outlined four
months ago was designed to ad
dress the specific weaknesses in
our economy and to remove obsta
cles that keep companies from hir
ing workers,” he said. “Those ob
stacles still exist. Congress needs
to move.”
Returning to the White House
from his Texas ranch, Bush stopped
in the home state of Sen. Blanche
Lincoln, a Democrat who support
ed the president’s 2001 tax cuts of
#1.3 trillion over 10 years but
wants to slash his new proposal.
The White House is two votes
short in the Senate for to pass a
tax bill and is targeting Lincoln
along with two Republican sena
tors — George Voinovich of Ohio
and Olympia Snowe of Maine —
who refuse to back another huge
cut on the grounds that it would
drive the federal budget deeper
into debt.
Lincoln was invited to attend
Bush’s event in Little Rock but,
citing scheduling conflicts, she de
clined.
So far, there is no indication
that the three are prepared to drop
their opposition to the tax plan.
Negotiations over the size and
shape of the package continue on
Capitol Hill.
Bush did not name Lincoln, but
he told listeners to urge their law
makers to approve the largest tax
package possible.
“The Congress needs to hear
from the people of Arkansas,” the
president said. “Democracy can
work, particularly when a lot of
people get on the phone or by e
mail and just let them know what’s
on your mind.”
Bush is intensifying pressure on
the Republican-controlled Con
gress to implement new tax
breaks, which are the centerpiece
of his domestic agenda. He wants
at least #550 billion in cuts over
10 years, but the Senate is threat
ening to reduce the package to
#350 billion.
“The good news is that the de
bate has shifted from no tax relief
to how much tax relief,” Bush said.
“Congress needs to move. They
need to move boldly. We don’t
need ... a little bitty tax-relief
plan. We need one that is strong
and robust.”
The president portrayed the
cuts as a jobs arid growth package
needed to invigorate the ailing
economy despite some econo
mists’ belief that most of the pack
age is focused in the long term
and would create little economic
activity and fewer jobs over the
next year.
Also, to counter criticisms that
the tax cuts would mainly benefit
the wealthiest taxpayers, Bush is
trying to present his proposal as a
boon to small-business owners,
who often pay individual income
taxes at the highest rates. Such
businesses would generate most of
the jobs the country needs to re
cover, he said, so aiding them
would help economic growth.
“Tax policy needs to encourage
positive decision-making in the
small-business sector because
small businesses are the lifeblood
for new employment,” the presi
dent said.
After unofficially kicking off his
re-election campaign with a na
tionally televised speech from
aboard the aircraft carrier USS
Abraham Lincoln last week, Bush
is expected to step up travel plans
to promote his domestic agenda
and lay the groundwork for next
year’s campaign.
While he spends much of his
time talking about the war on ter
rorism and his role in its success,
Bush is primarily trying to con
vince Americans that he knows
their economic problems.
“We have got challenges here at
home, to make sure that our econ
omy is strong enough so people
can find work,” he said.
Bush had been scheduled to
meet Monday with Canadian
Prime Minister Jean Chretien in
Ottawa. But the White House
“postponed” the trip after Canada
opposed the war in Iraq, saying
the president was too busy with
the Iraqi war to travel.
Instead, Bush met at his ranch
near Crawford, Texas, this week
end with Australian Prime Minis
ter John Howard, a staunch sup
porter of the Iraqi invasion.
“The reason why we welcomed
them there is because Australia is an
important ally of ours,” Bush told the
crowd Monday. “The Australians
fought beside our forces in Iraq.”
© 2003, Chicago Tribune.
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune
Information Services.
Scientists look into Midwestern storms
Robert S. Boyd
Knight Ridder Newspapers
WASHINGTON (KRT) — Govern
ment and university scientists an
nounced Monday a major study of why
big, violent storms occur and how they
can be predicted.
The study will cover the Midwest
thunderstorm zone from South Dako
ta to Ohio, using radar-bearing aircraft
and ground-based mobile laboratories.
It begins May 20 and runs through July
6 under the direction of the National
Center for Atmospheric Research in
Boulder, Colo.
The scientists will investigate huge
thunderstorm complexes that can
spread hurricane-force winds and tor
rential rains for hundreds of miles.
These monsters sometimes spin off
tornadoes, like those that killed at least
34 people in Kansas, Missouri and Ten
nessee this week. The $4 million study
was in the works long before this week.
“This (project) is a once-in-a-life
time experience,” said Ron Przybylin
ski of the St. Louis office of the National
Weather Service. “The more knowl
edge we have about the evolution of
these systems, the better we can pre
dict them.”
Most ordinary summer storms are
bom and die in an hour or two and
span about 12 miles. But these large
systems — known as mesoscale con
vective vortices — can be 500 miles
long and 90 miles wide. They typically
develop in the late afternoon and can
last all night, bringing winds up to 100
miles an hour and intense rainfall.
FRANKLIN, KS -
Robin Dixon
walks through
the remains of
her home in
Columbus,
Kansas, after
severe weather
and a tornado hit
the area on
Monday.
1 Brian Com
i Wichita Eagle
“The effects are like a land hurri
cane,” said Christopher Davis, co
leader of the project at the research
center.
Even after one of these storms de
cays, its low-pressure vortex may per
sist and give rise to a new storm the
next day. Several days of storms may
trail one another across the central
and eastern United States.
These storms sometimes give rise
to tornadoes at their leading or
trailing edge, as happened Sunday
and Monday. More typically, dam
age from superstorms is due to high
winds and floods.
One such vortex that began in
South Dakota in July 1977 traveled
1,000 miles east and produced a cata
strophic flood that killed 78 people in
Johnstown, Pa., according to Steve
Nelson, program director for
mesoscale meteorolology at the Na
tional Science Foundation.
Between January 1995 and July
2000, high winds from mesoscale
storms caused $1.4 billion in damages,
72 deaths and 1,000 injuries, accord
ing to the National Oceanic and At
mospheric Administration, which op
erates the Weather Service.
The study will be carried out
aboard three airplanes, based in St.
Louis, that will track developing
storms by flying in and around
them as the storms move eastward
across the Midwest. Meanwhile,
ground-based crews in mobile lab
oratories will deploy weather bal
loons and other instruments to
sample the storm environment.
Researchers have been using com
puter simulations to try to understand
how these storm clusters work, but un
til now there have been no large-scale
data-gatheringprojects.
“We’d gone about as far as we could
with the idealized simulations,” said
Morris Weisman, co-leader of the proj
ect at the atmospheric research cen
ter. “We needed to get good data. ”
© 2003, Knight Ridder/Tribune
Information Services.
News brief
White House blocks
release of information
on terrorism warnings
WASHINGTON — The Bush ad
ministration and the nation’s intelli
gence agencies are blocking the re
lease of sensitive information about
the Sept. 11,2001, terrorist attacks on
the World Trade Center and the Penta
gon, delaying publication of a900-page
congressional report on how the ter
rorist assault happened.
Intelligence officials insist the infor
mation must be kept secret for nation
al security reasons. But some of the in
formation is already broadly available
on the Internet or has been revealed in
interim reports on the investigation,
leading to charges that the administra
tion is simply trying to avoid enshrin
ing embarrassing details in the report.
Disputed information includes a
well-publicized warning from an FBI
agent that al-Qaida supporters might
be training in U.S. flight schools and
the names of the president and his na
tional security adviser as people who
may have received warnings that a ter
rorist attack was possible before Sept.
11,2001, one official said.
“We’re trying to keep in this report
some matters that have been talked
about in public, discussed in newspa
pers, and not to do that flies in the face
of common sense,” Rep. Porter Goss,
chairman of the House Intelligence
Committee, said on Monday.
—Frank Davies, Knight Ridder
Newspapers (KRT)
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