Isle delegation says Bush numbers don't add up

WASHINGTON — Members of Hawai‘i’s congressional delegation agreed with President Bush’s broad themes in his address to Congress last night but found fuzzy math in the details.

Vice President Dick Cheney, left, presiding officer of the Senate, and House Speaker Dennis Hastert join the standing ovation as President Bush addresses Congress. Associated Press

Increases in money for education and the military are good ideas, the lawmakers said, but they wondered how Bush would pay for the increases and also $1.6 trillion in tax cuts.

"I think people were rather surprised with his delivery," said senior Sen. Dan Inouye, a Democrat who watched the 49-minute speech on television from his suburban Washington home. "Many expected him to stumble. His delivery was very fine, but I think in order to fully appreciate his speech, one would need a calculator."

Bush said his budget would increase spending by 4 percent, but then he talked about doubling money for certain programs, Inouye said. "That means that some agencies are going to get wiped out. In math if you add something, you have to reduce something. What I will have to do now is look at the budget and see where the cuts are," he said.

Bush will send a budget outline to Congress today. But which programs would be in danger probably will not be clear until Bush sends a more detailed budget in April.

Inouye said Bush’s plan to increase money for schools, national parks, National Institutes of Health research, Veterans Affairs and military pay are good ideas. "The question is: At what expense are we increasing all of this?" he said.

Sen. Daniel Akaka, also a Democrat, attended the address and applauded Bush’s commitment to bipartisanship and his proposed money increases in education.

"President Bush’s focus on education is a welcome departure from past Republican policies," Akaka said in a statement. "The prospects are encouraging for bipartisan cooperation and significant progress on this issue.

"But the president’s numbers don’t add up, and much of his tax cuts are funded by projected surpluses between 2007 and 2011," Akaka said. "Six years down the road is too long a period to base tax or spending decisions costing trillions of dollars."

Akaka said he supports an across-the-board tax cut, but he believes that tax relief must be part of a budget that uses projected surpluses for Social Security and Medicare, prescription drug benefits, education and reduction of the national debt. Akaka said he also has "deep reservations" about privatizing Social Security.

Rep. Neil Abercrombie, who watched the address on television in his Capitol Hill office, said he thought it was "very interesting that the speech essentially reflected a lot of Democratic themes — spending for education, prescription drugs, a patients’ bill of rights, Social Security and Medicare."

But when Bush talked about his proposed tax cuts toward the end, Abercrombie said, "I thought to myself, ‘This doesn’t add up. How are you going to make the numbers work out?’ This is like saying we can eat all the ice cream we want and we’re still going to lose weight. That’s not a diet that’s going to work, and it’s not a fiscal or economic diet that will last."

Like Akaka, Abercrombie, a Democrat, said he supports tax cuts but would want them aimed at the middle class rather than the top of the income scale. Rep. Patsy Mink did not respond to requests for comment on Bush’s address.

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