Poor Larry Daughtrey
The latest political commentary from Larry Daughtrey in the Sunday Tennessean, about the demise of the proposed income tax and the passage of a 1 cent sales tax increase instead, is a usual mishmash of class warfare, half-truths, mis-representations and errors.

Daughtrey: "This is still a poor state, with a a per capita income of slightly over $26,000 a year. For Tennesseans living paycheck to paycheck – that's most of us - to feed, clothe and house a family, the sales tax is in reality a tax on income."

Fact: Daughtrey intentionally leaves out a relevant and key fact – per capita income has grown faster in Tennessee than many other states in recent years. Fact is, Tennessee's economic progress, including income measures, greatly surpasses a number of states that have adopted income taxes. Our economy has outperformed Connecticut ever since that state adopted an income tax a decade ago, and any useful comparison of Tennessee with neighboring (and very similar) Kentucky – gross economic output, per capita income, etc. - shows that Tennessee's economy left Kentucky's in the dust starting right after Kentucky imposed a state income tax.

Note also that Daughtrey grammatically includes himself in the group of Tennesseans ("most of us") living paycheck to paycheck.

Fact: The well-paid columnist and his well-paid federal judge wife live in Belle Meade, one of the wealthiest communities in America, where homes go for millions. Daughtrey friend Al Gore recently shelled out over $2 million for a rather modest home in Belle Meade. Given Daughtrey's rather lengthy tenure and high-profile position with The Tennessean - not to mention his Belle Meade address – it's rather unlikely he suffers along anywhere close to $26k per annum. The liberal columnist who fancies himself a champion of the little guy in fact lives in the lap of Belle Meade luxury.

Then Daughtrey comments that the sales tax is unfair because, "as income goes up, less and less of the total goes toward the sales tax as the more prosperous buy services and goods shielded from the tax collectors.

Fact: Technically true, but only because of a myriad of special-interest tax exemptions in the tax code – exemptions Daughtrey has often defended in his income-tax-or-bust commentaries. Daughtrey could have a more equitable tax code if he would support of lowering the sales tax rate and wiping out most of the $2.2 billion worth of exemptions in the code.

It is Daughtrey's summation, however, that really twists reality. He alleges that the income tax opposition was not really against higher taxes, only against taxing the rich.

"The ugliest part, to me," writes Daughtrey, "was the final posturing of the talk-radio puppet masters, their horn-honkers, and their champions in the legislature. In the end, most of them jumped aboard the sales tax bandwagon. It wasn't taxes they opposed, but a tax that might collect a fair share from those at the upper income levels. A 9.75% income tax on working families is just fine, thank you."

Fact: Many of the income tax opposition in fact do oppose higher taxes of any sort – but after three exhausting years of battling the income tax, it was clear that only a partial victory was possible. It had become clear that the legislature was hell-bent on raising taxes and increasing spending, and lacked the courage to put the brakes on Gov. Don Sundquist's excessive spending and billion-dollar-plus annual budget increases.

After three years, the plan to increase the sales tax got the anti-taxers' grudging support for a simple reason: It was the only non-income tax plan that had a chance of passing. Had it failed, the income tax would have been resurrected yet again.

Better, they rationalized, to settle this now with a one-year sales tax increase, and kick it to the next governor and a new legislature - both of which are likely to be more open to real discussion of reducing spending, cracking down on TennCare fraud, and better management of the billions in tax dollars the state already collects.

Daughtrey's column isn't available online as of this posting. When it is, I'll update this post with a link to it.