DES MOINES, Iowa — President Bush said yesterday that his tax cuts are driving the economy’s recovery and that Congress should make them permanent.
“It was nice of y’all to welcome someone from the federal government on tax day,” Mr. Bush joked, noting that thanks to his tax cuts, the annual deadline to submit tax returns wasn’t that bad this year.
Mr. Bush told a crowd of about 500 bankers at a Federal Home Loan Bank symposium that his tax cuts and a growing economy would “make rural America strong” and help create an atmosphere “where the farmer and rancher can make a living.”
The White House said that as a result of Mr. Bush’s tax cuts in 2001 and last year, the average income-tax refund is about $2,100. According to the Treasury Department, taxpayers kept $50 billion more in their pockets in 2003.
The president pointed out that he, too, lives in a rural area — Crawford, Texas — and said that through his tax cuts and his effort to cultivate an “army of compassion,” rural values will spread throughout the land.
“I oftentimes talk about the need to change this culture of ours in America from one that has said, ’If it feels good, why don’t you just go ahead and do it, and if you’ve got a problem, blame somebody else,’ to a culture in which each of us understands we’re responsible for the decisions we make in life,” Mr. Bush said. “And it’s changing.”
Mr. Bush lost Iowa to Al Gore in the 2000 presidential race by 4,000 votes, and it is considered by his campaign to be among a handful of states key for victory in November.
Recent polls in Iowa show Mr. Bush narrowly trailing Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, who won the Iowa caucuses in January. The Bush-Cheney campaign has targeted ads at Iowa for weeks, as well as at the other Midwestern swing states along the Mississippi River: Missouri, Minnesota and Arkansas.
Mr. Bush was introduced by Sen. Charles E. Grassley, whom the president thanked several times for helping push his economic agenda through Congress.
Mr. Grassley called Mr. Bush the “tax cutter in chief” and told the crowd that “we have a president who understands rural values.”
The Kerry campaign released a “flash ad” on the Internet yesterday outlining its “Middle-Class Misery Index.”
“President Bush likes to say his economic plan is helping the middle class, but that just shows how out of touch he is,” said Kerry spokesperson Phil Singer. “The American people need relief, but this president stubbornly refuses to help.”
Earlier in Washington, Mr. Bush welcomed the help of U.N. Undersecretary-General Lakhdar Brahimi, who returned from Iraq yesterday with ideas about how to undertake the switch of sovereignty to Iraqis.
Mr. Brahimi’s plan would create a caretaker government of Iraqis that would run the country until general elections could be held.
In Iowa, the president became visibly emotional when speaking about the troops fighting in Iraq. He spoke about the father of one soldier, Marine Lance Cpl. Ben Carman from Jefferson, Iowa, who “made the ultimate sacrifice.”
“The dad talking about his son. He said, ’He knew that America was in danger, and it was time for guys like him to step up to the plate,’” Mr. Bush said. “That’s what his dad said about his courageous son.
“Mr. Carman must know that our prayers are with him and with those of others who have lost a loved one in Iraq, and that the mission that his son was on was a noble and important mission for peace and freedom, and for the security of America. And we will stay the course in Iraq so that his son did not die in vain,” Mr. Bush said.
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