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Gabriella Hoffman’s paycheck is a little lighter today, thanks to a payroll tax increase that is forcing millions of Americans to make the kind of tough budget cuts their representatives in Washington lawmakers seem unwilling to tackle. Hoffman, a 21-year-old Virginian who works at a nonprofit, estimates her paycheck will be roughly $30 less this biweekly pay period, or about $780 annually, thanks to the end of a two-year cut on payroll taxes, which fund Social Security. The tax has risen back up to 6.2 percent from 4.2 percent, costing someone making $50,000 annually about $1,000 per year and a...

Ouch! Nothing hurts quite as much as kicking yourself in the shin. It looks like low information voters across America are waking up from the personality party they’ve been at for the past few years to discover that not only do their shiny Obama-bucks not go as far as they use to, butt now they’re taking fewer of those bucks home. Man, who could have seen that coming? I mean, shoot(am I still allowed to say that?), read Big Guy’s lips. He promised, remember?(snip)READ MY LIPS: NO MORE TAXES! And yet people across the country – not just wealthy Republicans –...

Democrat voters received a dose of economic reality after their New Year’s hangovers wore off, when they looked down at their 2013 paystubs and saw not Obama bucks, but higher federal taxes. How misplaced was their trust in re-electing defender of the middle class tax-raiser President Obama? Workers making $30,000 will take a bigger hit on their pay than those earning $500,000 under the fiscal cliff deal. And Democrats are seeking $1 trillion more in tax “revenue” by the end of this year. Now, it’s not nice to laugh at other people’s shock and surprise, but this is about as...

Middle-class workers will take a bigger hit to their income proportionately than those earning between $200,000 and $500,000 under the new fiscal cliff deal, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. Earners in the latter group will pay an average 1.3 percent more - or an additional $2,711 - in taxes this year, while workers making between $30,000 and $200,000 will see their paychecks shrink by as much as 1.7 percent - or up to $1,784 - the D.C.-based think tank reported. Overall, nearly 80 percent of households will pay more money to the federal government as a result of...

President Barack Obama issued an executive order to end the pay freeze on federal employees, in effect giving some federal workers a raise. One federal worker now to receive a pay increase is Vice President Joe Biden. According to disclosure forms, Biden made a cool $225,521 last year. After the pay increase, he'll now make $231,900 per year. Members of Congress, from the House and Senate, also will receive a little bump, as their annual salary will go from $174,000 to 174,900. Leadership in Congress, including the speaker of the House, will likewise get an increase.

Teachers’ Pensions Are a Half-Trillion ShortBy Kevin D. Williamson December 14, 2012 11:15 A.M. The habitual overpromising and underfunding of government-employee pensions is a fiscal powder keg in an economy full of sparks — and a new report estimates that teachers’ pensions alone are underfunded by nearly a half-trillion dollars. **SNIP** Note that the savings per teacher derived from the reform of eligibility rules runs $450,000, or more than two and a half times the average net worth of a retirement-age U.S. household. The real value of the average teacher’s retirement benefits in low-cost Wyoming is pushing the $1 million...

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President Barack Obama in 2008, and again during the 2012 election, promised absolutely, positively no tax hikes on the middle class. The rich, however, must pay more: "It's not me being stubborn, it's not me being partisan -- it's just a matter of math." How does Obama intend to pay for our cradle-to-grave welfare state? Why, by charging the dastardly "millionaires and billionaires" who "can afford to pay a little bit more." No more extending the Bush-era tax rates for the rich. To do so, Obama tells us, would "cost" $700 billion -- over 10 years. So this "break" for...

An American appetite for tax hikes gives President Barack Obama leverage in fiscal cliff negotiations.A new POLITICO/George Washington University Battleground Poll finds that 60 percent of respondents support raising taxes on households that earn more than $250,000 a year and 64 percent want to raise taxes on large corporations.

One of the earliest fears about tax-favored savings accounts like IRAs and 401(k) plans was that when this pool of savings grew large enough Congress would not be able to resist tapping it to help solve the nation’s debt problems. We’re about to find out if those fears—persistent for decades—have been justified. Everything including the sacred mortgage deduction is on the table as lawmakers wrestle with the fiscal cliff, a year-end avalanche of scheduled spending cuts and tax increases. With a combined $10 trillion sitting in IRAs and 401(k) plans, retirement accounts make a juicy target. Some of this money...

OLYMPIA, Wash. — Gov. Chris Gregoire's time in office may be best remembered for the major deals she helped broker, often in late-night bargaining sessions in which negotiators were ordered to find a resolution. Now the Democrat, two months away from leaving Washington state government, is looking to finalize one more big agreement.

Saxby Chambliss (GA), Lindsey Graham (SC), Bob Corker (TN), Eric Cantor (VA), Peter King (NY) - Each one waffles on a Democrat TV program - Quotes in "Comments."

A new CNN poll shows that more Americans would blame Republicans if the country went off the fiscal cliff rather than President Obama. 45 percent of those polled by CNN said they would blame Republicans more; 34 percent said they would blame Obama. But Republicans might have a political opportunity if they can convince Americans that President Obama is not working to cooperate with Republicans. According to CNN, nearly half say Obama is not doing enough to cooperate with the Republicans, although seven in ten want him to compromise with the GOP.

If a man sits on the bank of some great river and looks across to the other side, so tranquil does the current appear that it might seem to him as though the water isn’t really moving at all. Only when he looks closely will he see that the river is running steadily, ever so steadily, to the sea. And so it is with the course on which the city of Los Angeles finds itself. Visitors to the city will still find it to be a vibrant and interesting place to spend a week or two, with its pleasant climate...

Of all the misguided, corrupt and deranged ideas floating around inside the D.C. bubble, perhaps the single worst one is giving illegal aliens amnesty as part of some sort of attempt to capture the Hispanic vote. If the GOP were to pursue a policy that primarily benefits corrupt business owners, the government of Mexico, and Democrats at the expense of our country and our own base, we'd truly deserve the "Stupid Party" moniker that has so often been hung around our neck. This policy wouldn't be a calculated risk or even a longshot; it would be a game of Russian...

This is called surrendering before the war starts: Conservative commentator and Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol said Sunday the Republican Party should accept new ideas, including the much-criticized suggestion by Democrats that taxes be allowed to go up on the wealthy. ***** "It won't kill the country if we raise taxes a little bit on millionaires," he said on "Fox News Sunday." "It really won't, I don't think. I don't really understand why Republicans don't take Obama's offer." "Really? The Republican Party is going to fall on its sword to defend a bunch of millionaires, half of whom voted Democratic...

On Tuesday voters in California went the wrong way on three propositions. Voters approved Proposition 30 "temporarily" increasing the state sales tax and income tax on individuals making over $250,000. They voted against Proposition 31 that would allow the governor to cut the budget in fiscal emergencies. They voted against Proposition 32 would prevent unions from making campaign donations via members' dues. Moreover, and worse yet, Democrats picked up two more votes in the state legislature giving them a supermajority, capable of passing any tax hikes they want. Those results are so awful I suggest you prepare for the demise...

Rep. Ron Paul, whose maverick presidential bids shook the GOP, said in the wake of this week's elections that the country has already veered over the fiscal cliff and he sees no chance of righting ship in a country where too many people are dependent on government. "We're so far gone. We're over the cliff," the Texas Republican told Bloomberg Television's "In the Loop" program. "We cannot get enough people in Congress in the next 5-10 years who will do wise things." The video can be seen at http://www.bloomberg.com/video/ron-paul-on-fiscal-cliff-and-vows-to-compromise-MYkAiqYBTaiHwXZL9Tvxkw.html.

Americans for Job Security, a conservative, pro-business national group, is the true source of the $11 million last-minute infusion of campaign cash into a California political committee that supports an antiunion ballot measure and opposes Gov. Jerry Brown's tax proposition, state campaign finance regulators announced early Monday. But the hard-fought disclosure, which comes just one day before the election, creates more questions than it answers, because under federal law, Americans for Job Security does not have to reveal its donors.

LOS ANGELES - The choir sang, morning announcements were made and Mildred Rodgers watched as Gov. Jerry Brown took the pulpit at West Angeles Church of God in Christ. She has grown accustomed to politicians visiting in elections years. "Every voting season," Rodgers said. "It's really funny when we get two running for the same (office)." This morning there was only Brown, campaigning in four traditionally black churches here for his ballot initiative to raise the state sales tax and income taxes on California's highest earners. The churches Brown visited in Los Angeles' poorer neighborhoods have hosted Brown before, and...