Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Mr. Obama keeps attacking Republicans for refusing to pass his latest stimulus-spending splurge. He seems to have forgotten that less than two years ago the GOP won a landslide midterm election by promising voters they would end the avalanche of spending and debt.
The only jobs plan that has any chance of passing the House and Senate before the election is a bill to cancel all tax increases in 2013. With White House support, this would fly through the House and Senate and eliminate one major antigrowth headwind, as even some Keynesian economists and the Congressional Budget Office are telling the President.

The dilemma for the White House is that calling off next year's tax increase would undercut Mr. Obama's re-election theme of redistributing income. His liberal base has become so obsessed with the politics of envy that it is demanding higher taxes no matter the economic or political costs.

The question for Senate Democrats is whether they want to jeopardize their personal futures, and their majority, by jumping off the same tax cliff. With the House poised to pass an extension of the tax rates for at least one year, Senate Democrats have to decide if they want to vote before Election Day to wallop an already weak economy with a giant tax increase.

1 comment:

Baxter said...

Lets just extend the tax cuts that we can all agree on (for one year). Then, the Republicans can campaign hard on additional tax cuts for the wealthy. Let the chips fall where they may.