Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) is correct in seeing the idiocy in the Republican plan to lower taxes while proposing billions of added defense expenditures.

What good is there in leading the taxpayer on with a short-lived tax cut? Everyone would just go spend money while it lasts, leading to inflation as the deficit grows more and more. Then, the people of America would see their taxes raised even higher to compensate for lost time.

Well, there could be one good reason. Cutting taxes would be a great political move for the Republicans, especially with the 1996 presidential race kicking into high gear.

The Republicans are not capable of engineering a responsible tax cut, because without cutting enough expenditures, cutting income taxes will only lead to deficit spending. And when Republicans take the knife to the federal budget, they go for the small potatoes – public broadcasting, Head Start, and other good programs that do not have the saving grace of being preservational to the military industrial complex that got us into this budget crunch in the first place.

Sure, it would be fun to have a low-tax party with the Newtmeister for the next few years, but the party can’t last forever, and the ensuing hangover would last well into the next century.

At least Grassley has the courage to call it like it is.