The Healey camp's tax fib

Published Apr 18 2006, 09:28 PM by Adam Reilly

Ladies and gentlemen of the electorate....We have the first big distortion of the governor's race!

In a press release that came out earlier today--issued in conjunction with Republican Kerry Healey's photo-op calling for the state income tax to be rolled back to five percent-- the Healey camp said Democrat Deval Patrick "opposes tax relief and wants to increase taxes and state spending."

Here's the problem: Patrick has never actually said that he "wants to increase taxes."

A few minutes ago, Healey spokesperson Nate Little gave me his take on the apparent discrepancy, and cited a Patrick appearance on WRKO last December--in which Patrick said he was "still looking at" the possibility of raising the income tax--to help make his case. Here's what he had to say:

[Patrick] has been quoted, basically, saying that the rollback is a bad idea. In other remarks, he's alluded to the fact that he wants to open additional lines ot spending, in order to fund what he calls 'core programs.' He hasn't come out with his tax increase plan yet. But he's given no indication in any way that he'll be a friend to the taxpayer....I think, if he had his druthers, he'd increase taxes.

Sorry, Nate, but this one flunks the smell test. Patrick's refusal to rule out hiking the income tax should offer the LG (and Patrick's Democratic rivals) ample material to work with--enough, certainly, that there's no need to embellish the facts. Early in the campaign, when nobody's paying attention, this kind of screw-up probably won't hurt Healey. A few more like this, though, and she'll have herself a credibility problem.

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1 Comments

rightmiddleleft said:

All you have to do is google Patrick . he proposed to raise meal taxes, propert taxes and would not agree to roll back income taxes.

April 19, 2006 12:54 AM

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The Healey camp's tax fib

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