House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., in a speech Monday in his Atlanta area district, called for the establishment of an intergenerational commission--with one-third of its members from the Baby Boom generation, one-third from the pre-Baby Boom generation and one- third post-Boomers--to not only examine ways to overhaul Social Security, but also to look more broadly at ways to ensure workers' retirement security.
House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, immediately praised Gingrich's proposal as a way to depoliticize the always touchy issue of reforming Social Security. Noting that President Clinton has floated similar ideas about setting up a commission, Armey said the fact both leaders appear to be on the same page "opens the subject" for serious discussion.
Again assuming his role as GOP visionary-in-chief, Gingrich today outlined four major goals for the future: improving education, stepping up efforts to win the war on drugs, ensuring retirement security and capping individuals' total federal, state and local tax bills at 25 percent of their income.
"If we would focus on these four areas," Gingrich told the Cobb County (Ga.) Chamber of Commerce, "we could dramatically change the country."
Although he did not offer any specific proposals for limiting taxpayers' total tax burden to 25 percent, a Gingrich spokesman later suggested that attacking wasteful spending and inefficiencies in programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit and at the IRS could alone yield enough savings to pay for capping taxes at 25 percent.
Gingrich also said he wants to end capital gains and inheritance taxes, and that the first goal should be achieving a federal budget surplus.
On education, in remarks his spokesman said were aimed largely at the troubled District of Columbia school system, Gingrich said administrators of schools in crisis should be given 30 days to devise strategies for turning things around or be replaced. Gingrich also took a swipe at bilingual education, saying all children should know English by the fourth grade or be enrolled in language-immersion programs.
To combat drug use, Gingrich called for Congress, in reauthorizing the law that created the drug czar position, to expand that office's powers to take steps such as sealing off the southern U.S. border.
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