How One House Democrat Raised Taxes And Was Re-Elected Anyway

Note: I haven’t written on the budget compromise because it’s a compromise based on lies and cowardice, and I can’t find anything nice to say. It’s silly to believe the Republican ‘promise’ to raise taxes later … they’re the ones who defunded our government in the first place. Didn’t they ‘promise’ to replace the SBT too? It’s foolish for Dems to agree to this compromise in exchange for the opportunity to vote on a tax increase in an election year … are you freaking kidding me???? Democrats couldn’t even stand up to Mike Bishop in a non-election year, after sweeping the elections the year before. What are the odds that they’ll be willing & able to raise taxes in an election year?

Fortunately for my readers, I don’t want to suffer my karma by spewing forth another dose of blog hostility. So instead of telling you what I really think, I’ll simply pass on a story that I’ve collected from Bus Spaniola. House Dems could learn something from it. (if they could learn something)

Bumped, for the folks who were out of town last week

The 1970′s were hard on Michigan … an energy crisis, a sagging auto industry, growing unemployment, rising crime, and a decline in federal-aid programs.

1975-1976 were especially tough years for the Spaniola family. It was Francis R ‘Bus’ Spaniola’s first term as a State House Representative, and as luck would have it, he was stuck with a vote on a tax increase.

“The State of Michigan was suffering from diminishing credit ratings, meaning it was costing us more and more to borrow money. We had the lowest credit rating in union … even Puerto Rico was higher than we were, if I remember correctly. We had to increase taxes in order to deal with that structural problem.”

Spaniola represented Shiawassee — a primarily Republican, white, protestant county with a weak Democratic Party. As a Catholic, Italian, liberal Democrat, Spaniola was vulnerable on many fronts. He was considered a viable target for Republicans in 1976.

Bus recalls his friends and family advising him against voting for the tax increase. Conversations were peppered with phrases like ‘political grave’ and ‘one-termer.’ He believed in the tax increase, but he was also a realist, and he expected his vote to come at a great personal expense.

“They were really after me in those days — Having to vote for a tax increase in 1975 or 1976 was a horribly frightening experience, but I had to do what was right. I had to be able to look myself in the mirror.”

Ironically, it was a Republican who reassured Bus that he would survive the vote. In the 1970′s, the Michigan State Medical Society had a program called ‘Doctor of the Week’ (or Doctor as Legislator), in which medical doctors would spend a day in session with a House Representative. A few days before the vote on the tax increase, Bus was host to one of these doctors. After the legislative session, he and the doctor went to dinner.

“You don’t look too happy,” said the doctor. “What’s bothering you?”

“I’ve got to go vote for a tax increase within the next couple of days, but if I vote for it I’m in deep trouble. It will probably destroy my career.”

The doctor explained that he was a Republican and opposed to tax increases, and asked why the increase was necessary. Bus responded with a list of facts and figures; all the reasons why there was no other choice.

The doctor thought about this, and then answered, “If you were in my district and you gave me that explanation, I wouldn’t hold it against you, even though I’m a Republican. Go home and tell people the same thing you told me, and I think you’ll be alright.”

So that’s what Bus did. He voted for the tax increase, and then he went on air and gave his reasons for his vote. He explained the situation and he answered questions.

After raising taxes in his first term, this Catholic, Italian, wild-eyed liberal was re-elected 7 times.

“It’s a question of how you stand up an answer a question.” Bus explains. “You don’t even have to wait for a question, just explain to people, ‘here are the choices, which one do you want?’ The one that fixes the structure so that we don’t have this type of problem, and that allows us to function governmentally and in an intelligent way? Or are we going to allow things to deteriorate?”

“I know what it is to be frightened for your job, but there comes a time when you have to draw a line, you have to stand up and say ‘look, we can’t do this much longer.’”