[Bonaventure]

Gay marriage drives Sullivan's thought. He has soured on Bush's foreign policy on account of Bush's stand on gay marriage. How do you take that kind of thinking seriously?

[Steve_Seattle]

"Gay marriage drives Sullivan's thought."

That's how it seems to me. Ever since Bush came out in favor of the marriage amendment, Sullivan has soured on him. But I do agree with him on one point - the deficit. I think it is a huge mistake when conservatives give that issue to the Dems; the upper-bracket tax cuts were a mistake - they contributed to the deficit and gave Dems the "tax cuts for the rich" line which I'm sick of hearing. The economic downturn of 2000-2002 was not caused by suddenly higher taxes, and it wasn't ended by the tax cuts. It was just a self-correction of an economy in which the the dot.com phenomenon got out of hand and there were a lot of bad business decisions made. I think the upper-bracket tax cuts are almost suicidal for Republicans; it's a lose-lose proposition - there is no real economic benefit, it increases the deficit, and you lose the image war.