Posted on 11/29/2012 2:45:59 AM PST by Kaslin
One bright spot of Barack Obama's re-election was knowing that unemployment rates were about to soar for the precise groups that voted for him -- young people, unskilled workers and single women with degrees in gender studies. But now the Democrats are sullying my silver lining by forcing Republicans to block an utterly pointless tax-raising scheme in order to blame the coming economic Armageddon on them.
Democrats are proposing to reinstate the Bush tax cuts for everyone ... except "the rich." (Why do only tax cuts come with an expiration date? Why not tax increases? Why not Obamacare? How about New York City's "temporary" rent control measures intended for veterans returning from World War II?)
Raising taxes only on the top 2 percent of income earners will do nothing to reduce the deficit. There's not enough money there -- even assuming, contrary to all known history, that the top 2 percent won't find ways to reduce their taxable income or that the imaginary increased government revenue would be applied to deficit reduction, anyway.
Apart from Obamacare, it's difficult to think of a more effective method of destroying jobs than raising taxes on "the rich." This isn't a wealth tax on useless gigolos like John Kerry -- it's an income tax on people who are currently engaged in some profitable enterprise. Their business profits, which could have been used to hire more employees, will instead be used to pay the government.
But Republicans are over a barrel. Unless Republicans and Democrats reach an agreement, the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of the year. By pushing to extend the tax cuts for everyone except "the rich," Democrats get to look like champions of middle class tax cuts and Republicans can be portrayed as caring only about the rich.
And when the economy tanks, the Non-Fox Media will blame Republicans.
The economy will tank because, as you will recall, Obama is still president. Government rules, regulations, restrictions, forms and inspections are about to drown the productive sector. Obamacare is descending on job creators like a fly swatter on a gnat. Obama has already managed to produce the only "recovery" that is worse than the preceding recession since the Great Depression. And he says, "You ain't seen nothing yet."
The coming economic collapse is written in the stars, but if Republicans "obstruct" the Democrats by blocking tax hikes on top income earners, they're going to take 100 percent of the blame for the Obama economy.
You think not? The Non-Fox Media managed to persuade a majority of voters that the last four years of jobless misery was George W. Bush's fault, having nothing whatsoever to do with Obama.
The media have also managed to brand Republicans as the party of the rich, even as eight of the 10 richest counties voted for Obama. And that doesn't include pockets of vast wealth in cities -- Nob Hill in San Francisco, the North Shore of Chicago, the Upper East Side of Manhattan and the Back Bay of Boston -- whose residents invariably vote like welfare recipients. Seven of the 10 richest senators are Democrats. The very richest is the useless gigolo.
Republicans have a PR problem, not an economic theory problem. That doesn't mean they should cave on everything, but seeming to fight for "tax cuts for the rich" is a little close to the bone, no matter how tremendously counterproductive such taxes are.
Yes, conservatives can try harder to get the truth out, but as UCLA political science professor Tim Groseclose has shown, media bias already costs Republicans about 8 to 10 points in elections. Try arguing a year from now that Republicans' refusal to agree to tax hikes on the top 2 percent of income earners -- resulting in an expiration of all the Bush tax cuts -- had nothing to do with the inevitable economic disaster.
Republicans have got to make Obama own the economy.
They should spend from now until the end of the congressional calendar reading aloud from Thomas Sowell, Richard Epstein, John Lott and Milton Friedman and explaining why Obama's high tax, massive regulation agenda spells doom for the nation.
Then some Republicans can say: We think this is a bad idea, but Obama won the election and the media are poised to blame us for whatever happens next, so let's give his plan a whirl and see how the country likes it.
Republicans need to get absolute, 100 percent intellectual clarity on who bears responsibility for the next big recession. It is more important to win back the Senate in two years than it is to save the Democrats from their own idiotic tax plan. Unless Republicans give them an out, Democrats won't be able to hide from what they've done.
Even Democrats might back away from that deal.
If the Democrats could figure out a way to ban the Republican Party and exile all conservatives and everyone who ever even voted Republican (or better yet, to them, exterminate us as the vermin they believe we are), 500 years from now they'd still be blaming Republicans for everyone living in Brazilian shanty town conditions.
There, I said it. You all know it's true
The Non-Fox Media managed to persuade a majority of voters that the last four years of jobless misery was George W. Bush's fault, having nothing whatsoever to do with Obama.
As I said above. . .
Republicans have a PR problem, not an economic theory problem
Agreed, the problem the Republican Party is a failure of marketing.
Finally someone articulates what this is, in a way that explains why a tax increase on employers and investors will in the end harm precisely those its sponsors claim to want to "help".
However, as a small business owner (15 employees) I agree with Ann that the Republicans should educate, warn, and predict the increase in unemployment, and the increase in the prices of every product and service we buy, that will inevitably ensue as a result of the tax increase, but should attempt to negotiate in exchange a reduction in regulations. My company can withstand another 5% in income tax. Regulations and Obamacare are together costing me far more.
I just refinanced a commercial property to lower the mortgage payment, and was required to do a phase 2 environmental study-cost-$21,000. I've financed and refinanced properties for 30 years and had never been required to do more than a phase 1 environmental, which is far less expensive. Banks are, of course, getting their marching orders from the regulators now infested with leftists. This is how businesses that the Obama regime doesn't like will get targeted, mostly those businesses in industries that serve the poor.
Health care increase last year-14%. This year 23%.
Last year I had two more employees than I do now. Correlation? Sure. I say let the tax increases happen, and attempt to lower regulations on all business, not just small ones (suggestion-Dodd-Frank). The silver lining in this for me is that my customers are NOT getting tax increases, that is, those who manage to keep their jobs.
We can't give Bush a fourth term or Andy Cuomo will be president for his fifth.
You’re right, we can’t expect misinformed voters to understand anything about economic issues, all they know is what people like Letterman, Leno, Maddow, Schultz, Matthews, MSNBC etc., tells them.
The coming economic catastrophe will be “owned” by republicans, no matter what.
Bada ping! Exactamundo.
Republicans should announce that they will NOT oppose a tax increase.
But they should name the bill something like "ObamaCURE - a bill to solve all the country's problems."
But when the vote comes up, every Republican should vote PRESENT.
As soon as the Democrats realize that the upcoming fiscal collapse will be blamed entirely on them, they will quickly change their votes and the thing will be defeated.
but wouldn’t that make them just as guilty, or like if they didn’t care?
Give the Democrats everything they want. They think higher taxes on the rich will improve the economy? Let’s prove them wrong by letting them raise taxes. I’ve been saying this for months.
It is a damn poor mind indeed which can't
think of at least two ways to spell any word.
Andrew Jackson (democrat)
Fine idea in theory, but in reality, the Dems will “own” the economy only when it’s advantageous to do so.
I agree with your amendment. I hope they do this.
Absolutely right. Then, in 2 years, when they want to be re-elected, what happens? They run against people who correctly point out that the current representative went to DC, voted 'present' on the biggest legislation of our time, and didn't represent you. I see giving the dems everything they want as the only sure way to hand them back the House in 2 years.
At the very least, higher taxes on the rich will mean less they can donate to leftist political causes.
If the Repub leadership keeps giving the impression that they represent millionaires, then they’ll be out of power for a long time (forcing the morality/values issues into the background). People with no work or money don’t vote on values (which is why a conservative Repub should have easily beaten Obama earlier this month, but we never had a chance to try it).
If the Repub leadership keeps giving the impression that they represent millionaires, then they’ll be out of power for a long time (forcing the morality/values issues into the background). People with no work or money don’t vote on values (which is why a conservative Repub should have easily beaten Obama earlier this month, but we never had a chance to try it).
“They have won, we have lost and in doing so, the Country that we have loved will become a quaint memory.”
If the Dems didn’t miss by so much in the House I’d agree with you. Let Americans have four more years of President Foodstamps and we’ll see how receptive they are to having an intelligent, literate president again.
You make a valid point, I think you hit the nail on the head, I agree, that’s true, I just fear tax increases on the rich will be passed onto the middle class and the poor via consumption in a poor economy where things like food sizes have already been reduced due to inflation.
I’m not even advocating raising the taxes on the rich; the Repubs just have to stop letting the media paint them as representing the 1%.
Nobody runs a business to lose money, or just break even; when you destroy the profit motive you destroy business (and the related jobs). That in a nutshell is the fatal economic flaw of communism (and to a lesser extent Western European-style socialism); there is no incentive to excel.
I like that.
When the vote comes up every Republican should vote PRESENT.
That was the usual vote of Obama when he was in the Senate.
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