PRESIDENTIAL RACE Bush attacks Kerry's plan to increase tax rates

Kerry took a break Sunday to celebrate his daughter's birthday.
KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
PARKERSBURG, W.Va. -- President Bush went after Democrat John Kerry on taxes Sunday, telling a West Virginia crowd that Kerry's plan would hurt job growth.
Campaigning on a sun-baked high school football field, Bush said Kerry's plan to raise tax rates for taxpayers earning over $200,000 would hurt 900,000 small business owners. Many small business owners report their business profits on their personal tax returns.
"This Labor Day weekend it is important for American workers to know that my opponent wants to tax your jobs," Bush said. "Raising taxes will stifle job creation."
Kerry took the day off Sunday, but campaign aides disputed Bush's assertion. Internal Revenue Service figures from 2001 indicate that 750,000 Americans in the top tax bracket reported various types of small-business income, but the figure includes taxpayers such as consultants, lawyers and others who would not typically be considered small business owners.
"His definition of small business would include himself and Dick Cheney, but Americans know that they haven't created any new jobs," Kerry spokesman Phil Singer said.
Proposed tax breaks
Kerry has also proposed some tax breaks aimed at small businesses. He would offer tax credits for new jobs created by companies with fewer than 99 workers and tax breaks for companies that provide health care to low- and moderate-income workers.
While Kerry celebrated his daughter Alexandra's 31st birthday at his wife's estate in Fox Chapel, Pa., near Pittsburgh, his advisers mapped out a strategy to keep the campaign focus on the economy and other domestic issues.
Democrats are eager to steer the campaign back to issues that tend to favor them after a four-day Republican convention that highlighted national security.
"We will be fighting back using Bush's own record on the economy, jobs and health care against him," Democratic Party chairman Terrence McAuliffe told reporters in a Sunday conference call. "He now will have the record, with Herbert Hoover, of not creating a single new job."