Interview: Adam Hughes

Is Grover Norquist's "Starve the beast" theory not valid?

Talking points

• What is the OMB? • AMT delay • Capital gains tax • Estate tax problem • Rich vs. poor • Starve the beast theory • Recession threat • Progressive tax • Activists' role

His theory is that cutting taxes will cut off the ability for government services to continue. The Bush administration is evidence that it doesn't work that way. Even though he drastically cut taxes, he raised spending to historic levels. Along with the war spending, he implemented an $800 billion Medicare prescription drug program -- that's the projected cost for the first 10 years -- and rapid increases in health care costs, both in the public and private sectors, have caused a steady and growing increase in the cost of Medicare and Medicaid.

The evidence shows that the starve-the-beast theory doesn't work. What it does do is show that when you box the government in, it can't provide for the needs of the country. It could be military, health, research, infrastructure -- across the board what the government does is more difficult to do because of the federal debt situation.

Grover Norquist's organization, Americans for Tax Reform, are calling on the presidential candidates to sign a pledge not to raise taxes.

I think that's kind of silly. The first President Bush said he wasn't going to raise taxes and did and got blasted for it. And he was right to raise taxes. Every fiscal analyst has been saying for years that the federal government needs to both raise taxes and cut spending in order to make things balance out. So if you're signing a pledge to say you will not do that, you are either willingly neglecting that research or are making a promise you can't or shouldn't keep.

There are some rumblings about the threat of economic recession, and some speculation that our leaders may give in to continuing the tax cuts from 2001 because of that threat.

That's a very general statement, about a coming recession. There's not a lot of evidence that higher taxes have a negative effect on economic growth. The 1990s under Clinton showed this was not the case.