Va. Governor a Fiscal Model for Kerry

[CShine]

WASHINGTON - Governing one of the nation's most conservative states, Virginia Gov. Mark Warner exploited a GOP rift over taxes, slashed spending and forged a bipartisan pro-business coalition to pass a $1.4 billion tax increase this year. Now he's holding himself up as a model of fiscal discipline for fellow Democrats, including presidential candidate John Kerry.

"I believe what we have done in Virginia contains some pretty important lessons for Democrats throughout the United States and our colleagues in Congress," Warner told the moderate Democratic Leadership Council. "Because I believe today we're in a time that cries out for leadership ... on fiscal issues."

Kerry, who accepts the Democratic nomination in late July, wants to roll back portions of President Bush's tax cuts approved by a GOP-led Congress. Warner secured the $1.4 billion budget-balancing tax increase from a heavily Republican legislature. It provides an unprecedented spending boost for public schools, long-deferred state employee pay raises and new money for law enforcement and colleges. Warner had help from 17 state House Republicans who defied their party's unforgiving anti-tax orthodoxy. Anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist says those lawmakers — and their GOP brethren backing taxes elsewhere in the country — "will pay a price with their careers."

Warner, elected in 2001 and bound to one term by the state constitution, will become chairman of the National Governors Association next month. He has been mentioned as a possible vice presidential candidate, but Warner said he has not talked to Kerry about the job and his vast financial holdings are not being reviewed by the candidate's search team. Virginia is the latest state to raise taxes and fees with a Republican-led legislature, a GOP governor or both. Others include Alaska, Nevada, Idaho and Ohio. To the dismay of ideological conservatives who strongly oppose tax hikes, the more pragmatic and pro-business arm of the GOP is raising its voice to fill budget gaps caused by national economic declines and to protect education, health and infrastructure budgets that benefit the private sector.

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