DEMS STEAL TAX-CUTTING THUNDER

House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt today tried to end-run the GOP tax-cut fervor by proposing that four-fifths of Americans in lower income groups pay a flat tax of between 10 and 11 percent. The wealthiest Americans under the Gephardt proposal would pay a higher rate, not yet specified. Gephardt floated the plan in testimony before the House and Ways Mean Committee. He also attacked the alternative GOP flat-tax plan, pushed by House Majority Leader Richard Armey (R-Texas), as "a massive redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the wealthiest Americans" because it exempts income from interest, dividends and capital gains. Armey says that everyone should pay a flat rate of 17 percent.