
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, August 3, 1993                   TAG: 9308030211
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

BUDGET SET FOR SHOWDOWN

Adding last-minute sweeteners to woo crucial Senate votes, Democratic leaders sealed a budget deal Monday that they said would lower the deficit by $496 billion over the next five years to carry out President Clinton's economic program.

Senate-House negotiators agreed to soften a tax bite on Social Security recipients as they wrapped up a package of politically painful tax increases and spending cuts, setting the stage for showdown battles in the House and Senate later this week.

Democratic leaders predicted that the plan, including massive tax boosts for the wealthy and a gasoline tax increase of 4.3 cents a gallon that will affect nearly all Americans, would win approval in both chambers despite unanimous Republican opposition and defections by many Democrats.

At the White House, Clinton prepared to deliver a nationally televised address tonight to drum up support, saying he will argue: "It's time to move. To delay this program is a great mistake. All it will do is paralyze the government, paralyze the financial markets and leave us with uncertainty."

As they have throughout the budget process, Republicans expressed vigorous opposition. Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan., denounced the measure as "the largest tax increase in the history of the world" and called for its defeat.

White House officials acknowledged that the outcome might be decided by a single vote in the Senate and only a handful in the House. The House was expected to vote Thursday and the Senate was scheduled to act on Friday.

Full details of the agreement were withheld, , although the major provisions were made known previously and only a relatively few last-minute changes were not disclosed.

Congressional aides said the package would restrain the growth of spending by $252 billion and raise taxes by $244 billion in a five-year span, meeting demands for more spending reductions than revenue increases. Republicans, however, dismissed the figures as misleading and said new taxes were at least twice as great as spending cuts.

by CNB