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Issues/News>
SL Tribune: Candidates Debate Economy
June 12, 2008
3rd District race
Incumbent Cannon, challenger Chaffetz debate solutions to
economic woes
By Robert Gehrke
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated: 06/12/2008 11:39:52 AM MDT
With gas passing $4 a gallon, the housing market sputtering
and national jobless numbers spiking, the uncertain economy
has become a pivotal issue of the 3rd Congressional
District battle between Rep. Chris Cannon and challenger
Jason Chaffetz.
"I think it ranks as one of the top issues because the
economy affects everybody," said Heather Tucker, of West
Jordan, whose husband works from home because his company
downsized. "People are having to cut back on their
businesses and their expenses and the prices of gas and
food, that affects us personally."
Cannon, who is seeking a seventh term in Congress, says
the economy will get better if Republicans retake control
in Washington. "Even the midterm outlook is rosy," he says,
if Democrats are run out.
"You get government out of the way, America will be
robust, grow and overcome these minor problems over the
short term," he said.
But Chaffetz says Cannon and his colleagues missed
their chance to help the economy when Republicans
controlled the House, the Senate and the presidency.
Not only did they fail to do their job, he says, they
compounded problems by nearly doubling the federal budget,
running up the national debt and weakening the value of the
dollar.
"Congress has failed when it relates to managing its
own expenses and I squarely blame Mister Cannon and the
rest of the Republicans," Chaffetz said. Specifically, he
points to Cannon's vote for the $2.8 trillion budget in
2006, the last under Republican control.
Chaffetz supports doing away with congressional
earmarks, which totaled about $18 billion last year,
according to the group Taxpayers for Common Sense. Chaffetz
pledges not to seek any earmarks for his district. He also
embraces a proposal from Mitt Romney during his
presidential bid to cap the growth of nondefense spending
at 1 percent below inflation.
"You can't be all things to all people and we're in a
crisis when it relates to the U.S. economy as a direct
consequence of the United States Congress' failure to deal
with the budget," he said.
Cannon said he has done his best to hold down the
exploding cost of government.
"If we had conservatives running Congress instead of
Republicans, [budgets] would be smaller," said Cannon, who
considers himself among the true conservatives.
Cannon said the growth in government spending is, in
part, due to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, but Chaffetz
says that Americans have not been asked to make the
sacrifices needed to pay for the war.
Cannon and Chaffetz both say the economic $168 billion
stimulus package backed by President Bush, that returned
several hundred dollars apiece to U.S. taxpayers, was a bad
idea, although Cannon voted for the rebate package. He said
the legislation included tax changes that he supported.
Chaffetz called the bill a "redistribution of wealth."
Both candidates support extending the Bush tax cuts,
which are due to expire at the end of 2010, although that
and a fix to the alternative-minimum tax would add $3.5
trillion to the national debt over the next decade,
according to the nonpartisan Urban Institute.
Cannon says the key to righting the economy will be
electing Republicans to Congress and the White House in the
fall and passing legislation to expedite the extraction of
oil from oil shale in Utah, Colorado and Wyoming.
The estimated 800 billion barrels of oil that the Rand
Corp. estimates is in the rock could dramatically reduce
the cost of energy and help get the economy moving again,
Cannon said.
He introduced a bill this week allowing the president
to limit challenges to oil shale projects, aimed at getting
the oil to market faster. Chaffetz dismissed the bill as a
campaign stunt that Cannon would have introduced earlier if
he was serious about it.
Jason Chaffetz
* Vows not to request any earmarks: "The merits of
these projects have got to stand on their own."
* Wants to cap federal non-defense spending at 1
percent below inflation.
* Says that, according to government evaluations, 28
percent of federal programs are not serving their purposes
and their funding should be targeted: "Republicans have
lost the mantle of fiscal discipline. We're going to have
to lead out on the hard ones, not just the easy ones.
That's called leadership, and we lack it now in
Washington."
* Supports eliminating the federal Department of
Education, although some aid to college students could be
continued.
* Supports extending the Bush tax cuts
* Opposes federal aid to homeowners: "Markets need to
adjust, and although it's painful, it's a healthy and
necessary part of a market-driven economy. It's not the
role of government to go in and bail everybody out."
* Opposed Bush's economic stimulus plan: "[It was]
government redistribution of wealth, Cannon voted for it, I
opposed it. It was wrong."
Cannon on the economy:
* "It's clear we're doing better [today] than we
thought several months ago. The best thing government can
do is stay out of the way. The most important thing we can
do for the economy is bring down the cost of energy. It is
the regulatory restraints that are the problem."
* Congress must address gas prices: "It's hard to have
a robust economy when you have those kinds of distortions
in the market."
* Developing Utah's oil shale could solve those
problems.
* Supports shrinking the federal budget, but voted for
Republican budgets growing the size of federal government
and federal debt: "I worked hard to keep them smaller and
if we had conservatives running Congress instead of
Republicans, [budgets] would be smaller."
* "I think earmarks should be transparent from request
to granting."
* Said he opposed tax rebates to stimulate the economy,
but voted for the bill because he supported other tax
policy changes in the bill: "I'm not sure there is any
sense in spending your way out of hardship, but I think it
had some stimulus effect on the economy.
* Opposes any bailout for homeowners: "I don't think it
is prudent for government to bailout people who are
improvident."
(Tip of the day: Jason's last name is pronounced "Chay-fits")
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