Read my lips: no new taxes

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George Bush in the 1988 election campaign

"Read my lips: no new taxes" (literally: " Read it from my lips from: no new taxes ", something like: " Take my word for it: no new taxes ") was a promise of the American presidential candidate George Bush , which he on Made August 18, 1988 as part of his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in Louisiana . The sentence comes from the speechwriter Peggy Noonan and became the most famous part of the speech. The promise was an important statement in the 1988 campaign. It is considered by some to be one of the main reasons Bush won the US presidential election in 1988 .

After his election, the slowdown in economic growth and a Democratic majority in Congress forced Bush to compromise. In 1990 he raised various taxes and broke his election promise. This created great resentment, especially among conservative Republicans . In 1992, Bush was accused of breaching his election promise in the primary by his Republican challenger, Pat Buchanan . In the 1992 presidential election , Bill Clinton also used the phrase to discredit Bush.

The promise

Peggy Noonan, here at the White House with Reagan in 1988.

At the time of the convention, Bush's nomination as a presidential candidate was already certain. Nonetheless, his advisers were concerned about the lack of enthusiasm for Bush in the party's conservative wing. In the words of his advisor James Pinkerton , taxes are an issue that is able to unite all conservatives without annoying anyone else. For this reason, a clear “no new taxes” promise was made in the acceptance speech. The full text of the tax issue read:

I'm the one who will not raise taxes. My opponent says he'll raise them as a last resort, or a third resort. But when a politician talks like that, you know that's one resort he'll be checking into. My opponent won't rule out raising taxes. But I want. And The Congress will push me to raise taxes and I'll say no. And they'll push, and I'll say no, and they'll push again, and all I can say to them is "Read my lips: no new taxes. "

Analogous:

I'm the one who won't raise taxes. My opponent says he'll raise it as a last resort - or a third way out. But when a politician says something like that, you know that he is headed for this way out. My opponent doesn't want to rule out a tax hike, but I do. Congress will push me to raise taxes and I will say no. They will urge me to do it, I will say no, and they will urge me to do it again, and all I can tell them is: "Take my word for it: no new taxes"

The section was written by Peggy Noonan, principal speechwriter. The idea goes back to a suggestion by Congressman Jack Kemp , who later became Minister of Construction under Bush. The inclusion of the last line caused disagreement among the advisors. Some criticized the harsh choice of words. The most prominent critic was Bush's economic adviser Richard Darman . He described the line as "stupid and dangerous". Darman was one of the architects of Ronald Reagan's 1982 tax increase and promised himself an important role in the Bush administration. He believed that such a one hundred percent promise would limit the government's ability to act. On the advice of others, notably Roger Ailes , the passage was included in the speech anyway. It was felt that the promise was necessary to ensure the support of the conservative part of the party for the otherwise more moderate election campaign. Furthermore, the promise was made that the candidate, who had previously been considered weak and fickle, could be given a sharper profile. At the time, Bush was well behind Democrat Michael Dukakis in the polls . Darman criticized that the campaign was designed much more to win the election than to lay a foundation for governance.

The sentence "Read my lips: no new taxes", presented with visible conviction and dedication, became one of the most shown clips in the media, just as the campaign team had intended. Bush ultimately won the election well ahead of Dukakis.

The tax hike

After winning the election, it was difficult for Bush to keep his promise. The calculations during the election campaign assumed that the strong growth of the late 1980s would continue during the Bush administration. However, things turned out differently and the economy fell into a deep recession . The government deficit grew significantly in 1990 as a result of falling income and increasing expenditure . The Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act , passed by the Senate in 1985, forced Congress and the President to reduce the deficit. Otherwise government spending would have been automatically reduced, which was not in the interests of either the Republicans or the Democrats. A sensible and targeted cut in government spending was difficult, since waste had already been combated in the Reagan era and easy-to-implement savings had been made. Further cuts with a sufficient effect should have been made in the areas of social security systems, the health sector or the military. Majority Democrats in Congress opposed drastic cuts unless they were accompanied by at least some tax hikes.

Despite these problems, the 1989 budget was passed without major problems. This was mainly because the White House and Dan Rostenkowski , chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means , agreed to postpone talks on benefit cuts and tax increases until next year.

Drawing up the budget for 1990 was much more difficult. Bush initially submitted a draft to Congress that contained significant cuts but no tax increases. This was rejected by the Democrats in Congress. It was clear that a compromise on tax increases had to be found in the subsequent negotiations. Richard Darman, who has since been appointed head of the Office of Management and Budget , and Chief of Staff John Sununu advocated such a compromise. Other prominent Republicans such as Gerald Ford , Paul O'Neill and Lamar Alexander shared this opinion . The only alternative would have been to veto every draft budget from Congress, risking government benefits to be suspended next year or possibly triggering the automatic cuts in the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act.

In late July, Bush commented on the subject as follows:

"it is clear to me that both the size of the deficit problem and the need for a package that can be enacted require all of the following: entitlement and mandatory program reform, tax revenue increases, growth incentives, discretionary spending reductions, orderly reductions in defense expenditures, and budget process reform. "

Analogous:

"I understand that both the size of the deficit and the need to put together a package that can be adopted require all of these points: reform of entitlements and state programs, increasing tax revenues, supporting economic growth, a reduction in freely available expenditure, systematic reductions in defense spending and a reform of budget negotiations. "

The key point was the reference to the increase in tax revenue, which was now up for negotiation. The publication of the statements caused a sensation. The New York Post headlined “Read my Lips: I Song” the following day. Initially, some Republicans argued that an increase in tax revenue did not necessarily mean a tax increase. It could also mean that the state is working to increase the taxable income of employees and companies. A short time later, however, Bush confirmed the upcoming tax increases.

Major critics of the policy change have included Republicans such as Vice President Dan Quayle , Newt Gingrich, and the Senate leadership. They felt that Bush had destroyed the Republicans' most important electoral argument for years to come. They were also upset that the Republican leadership had not been informed of the move in advance. The perceived betrayal led to fighting within the Republican Party. When Sununu called Gingrich to tell him the news, Gingrich hung up angrily. When Senator Trent Lott questioned the change of direction, Sununu told the press that Lott was meaningless in this regard. Ed Rollins , chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee , was removed from office after a memo calling on Republican congressmen to distance themselves from the president if they were interested in re-election. Many Republicans believed that reversing the old policy, if necessary, had at least been poorly carried out. The announcement was simply pinned to the press center bulletin board. There had been no effort to sell the news well or to defend the paradigm shift, no attempt to slowly introduce the people to the idea of ​​a tax hike in order to convince them of the need. No influential Republicans had been used as advocates to turn the U-turn closer to the conservative base.

In September, Bush tabled a new draft budget endorsed by the Congressional leadership. This included an immediate increase in the tax on gasoline of 5 cents per gallon and a gradual increase in subsequent years. Surprisingly, the proposal was rejected by the House of Representatives . Over 100 Conservative Republicans, led by Newt Gingrich, voted against the proposal because of the tax hike. At the same time, many dissenting votes came from the left-wing Democratic camp, who feared that the poorer sections of the population would be burdened by the sharp increase in a consumption tax. Bush stopped the continuation decision, and as a result, the federal government was incapacitated over the Columbus Day weekend on October 5 . Three days later, Bush approved a new draft, and a short time later the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990 was passed. In the new draft, parts of the mineral oil tax increases have been replaced by a ten percent surcharge on top of the top tax rate (which increases the marginal tax rate to 30.8%) and additional taxes on alcohol , tobacco products , cars and luxury yachts .

Bush's popularity suffered as a result of these events. From a peak of 79% at the beginning of his tenure, the approval rating for Bush's policies fell to just 56% in mid-October 1990. That year, the American Dialect Society chose the term Bushlips , meaning an insincere political statement, as its Word of the Year. The whole development was a severe blow to all Republicans, who suffered heavy losses in the mid-term elections in the Senate and House of Representatives. A short time later, the Gulf War made the events forget and the approval rates for Bush rose significantly again.

The 1992 election

The reversal in tax policy has occasionally been discussed during the Democratic nomination phase. However, this topic was widely spread through Pat Buchanan , Bush's challenger in the Republican primaries. Buchanan cited repentance as one of the main reasons to challenge Bush. On the day he entered the primary campaign, he said he was running “because we Republicans can no longer say it was all a mistake by the left. It wasn't just any left-wing Democrat who said 'Read my lips: no new taxes', broke his promise to do a shabby backroom deal with the big money distributors on Capitol Hill ”. Buchanan then made regular use of the Bush quote in his campaign for New Hampshire and used it for his election commercials on radio and television. Buchanan surprisingly won 40% of the vote in New Hampshire, which gave Bush a dramatically poor result for an incumbent president. Bush's first response was that the state of the economy made a tax hike necessary. Surveys have shown that most Americans would agree that some tax hike is necessary. The bigger problem for Bush was the loss of trust and respect.

As the Georgia primaries drew nearer and Buchanan was still a threat, Bush changed his strategy and apologized for the tax hike: "I did it and I regret it and I regret it", admitting that he hasn’t raised taxes yet would increase once if he could turn back time. During the October 19th debate, he repeated several times that it was a mistake to raise taxes and that he "should have held out for a better deal". These excuses were ineffective. The broken promise weighed on Bush throughout the election campaign.

Democratic candidate Bill Clinton , who did not consider the tax hike wrong, managed to use the broken promise in the final phase of the campaign. In October 1992, a television ad created by campaign manager James Carville repeatedly showed Bush making the promise. The spot was designed to expose Bush's treacherous character and is considered one of the most effective spots. The tax lie played a crucial role in the poorer assessment of Bush's character. Despite the numerous scandals that weighed on Clinton during the election campaign, both candidates were believed to be of equal integrity. Clinton's most effective, the "How're-you-doin- (How-are-you-are-you?)" Spot also contained an excerpt from the "Read-my-lips" speech.

Pop culture references and parodies

As a result of the broken promise, the quote was taken up by numerous artists.

It appeared in the song Foreclosure of a Dream , released by Megadeth in 1992 on the album Countdown to Extinction . The song is about the bassist's family. They were farmers in Minnesota and were unemployed during the Reagan era.

In 2005, Mudvayne used the quote in their song Choices . The song is anti-political and calls heads of state irresponsible. The quote is one of several intended to underline this thesis.

Don Was used numerous excerpts of the speech as audio samples and produced the single Read My Lips in 1988 under the pseudonym "A Thousand Points of Night" . The accompanying music video also shows excerpts and video snippets from Bush's speech and various television appearances. The music video caused a lot of controversy in the media when it aired on MTV during the 1992 Bush / Clinton / Perot presidential election.

In the 1991 film Hot Shots , the quote appears in a flashback. Topper Harley is distracted by various memories and therefore loses control of the plane. One of these memories is the bus speech.

The sentence has often been parodied by replacing the words "lips" or "taxes". Dana Carvey used different variations of the phrase on the television show Saturday Night Live . Even the Bush family itself changed the quote from time to time. For example, Bush said to a reporter who bothered him while jogging, “read my hips” (read it from my hips). His son George W. Bush complained during his time as governor in Texas with the words "read my lips: no more tuxes." (Read it from my lips: no more tuxedos ) about the too formal attire.

The quote became the name of a party, even if it was only a bogus party. In the 2002 election to the US House of Representatives, Sam Garst ran as a candidate for the No New Taxes Party in Minnesota's third district . Garst was a supporter of incumbent Democrat Bill Luther and allegedly wanted to dispute Republican challenger John Kline's votes in the close race. The plan failed when Kline accused Luther of conducting a dirty election campaign because Luther's campaign manager knew of Garst's candidacy. Kline called for Garst to take part in the candidate debates. Garst left the district during the election campaign. Kline won the election, and Garst won over 12,000 votes, which is about 4%.

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