Posted on 11/17/2011 11:20:30 AM PST by Sub-Driver
Pelosi to supercommittee Republicans: Tax the rich to avoid defense cuts By Mike Lillis - 11/17/11 12:04 PM ET
If Republicans wish to avoid defense cuts, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi warned Thursday, they should agree with Democrats to tax the rich.
The California Democrat accused Republicans of feeling more bound to the anti-tax pledge of Grover Norquist, head of the conservative Americans for Tax Reform, than to their oath to serve and defend the country.
“The sequester is what it is,” Pelosi said during a press briefing in the Capitol, referring to the $1.2 trillion in automatic cuts that would be triggered if the supercommittee fails to agree to that amount in deficit reduction over the next decade.
“There are some who think or have suggested that the oath to Mr. Norquist is more important than other oaths that members take.”
The automatic cuts would be split between defense and domestic programs. A number of leading Republicans, as well as Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, have warned that Pentagon cuts of such magnitude would cripple the country’s defense capabilities.
Pelosi on Thursday said Democrats are no less concerned with the nation’s strength — both in terms of defense and domestic affairs. But the entire idea behind making the automatic cuts so unattractive, she noted, was to force the supercommittee members to make the tough choices required to reach a deal.
“The thought with sequester is that we’re all very concerned about our national defense and the strength of our country, whether it’s measuring the health and education [and] well-being of our people on one side of the sequester, and as it is measured in our military strength,” she said.
“We would rather there be a better way to do this. But if you refuse … to take one red cent from the wealthiest people in our country and the price we have to pay is the diminished defense and the diminished strength of our country, I think that something is [wrong] here.
“That could be avoided,” Pelosi said, if supercommittee Republicans would agree to a broader plan that brings tax-revenue increases in closer balance to the domestic cuts the Democrats have laid on the table.
“One might judge that the Republicans are more concerned about not taxing anymore,” she said.
Pelosi’s remarks arrive as Democrats are feeling they have the upper hand as the supercommittee scrambles to find $1.2 trillion in deficit savings by Nov. 23 or trigger the automatic cuts.
Last week, Republicans on the supercommittee offered a plan to hike tax revenues by $250 billion as long as the Bush-era tax cuts were expanded and extended.
Pelosi on Thursday rejected that plan outright.
“If the plan is to extend the Bush tax cuts, and to repeal the Medicare guarantee for our seniors, well that’s not balanced and that’s a place we cannot go,” she said.
That is insult to females and dogs
There will be no spending cuts, as a matter of fact, the $300B in taxes the GOP will agree to raise, the Democrats want to spend it on stimulus.
really.
If “we the people” ever take charge I’m all for confiscating 90% of the wealth from the estate of every person who served in congress more than 10 years. Because we know that’s probably about how much was accumulated since they took office. We can pro-rate from there.
I say from their estate because the actual office holders should be on a pike.
I’d bet these crooks have most of their wealth in Swiss accounts and they probably have private shelters where they’ve stashed all of their precious metals. Man, have we been taken for a ride.
What Democrats are saying is that if we want deficit reduction they will give us the following choices :
1) Raise taxes on ‘the rich’
Note that taxes go up after the election is nothing is done.
2) Cut defense
And a third option being no deficit reduction.
Alternatively a passed and signed budget bill in 2013 could replace the trigger cuts, but we are likely to have the same problem then as we did this year: gridlock. Plus at this point we CAN'T count on Republicans doing especially well in the next election.
RIGHT!!!!
We need a tax code which SPECIFICALLY addresses millionaire CONGRESSMEN at 75% of their assets. After a few years THAT might flush them out of office as they won;t have anything left to run with - cashwise!!!
There is so much waste in the DOD right now that they could suffer some cuts.
If the GOP walks from the tax cut side and triggers the across-the-board cuts, it would be the smartest thing they could do. It would be the first REAL spending cuts they GOP has accomplished in decades.
Both sides win.
Pelosis meant: “Class warfare is more important than America’s defense.”
Nancy Pelosi wants to play “chicken”. She knows that the Republicans have a strong sense of responsibility and will do what ever it takes to “provide for the common defense” so... maybe the time has come to draw the line. Without a viable economy we won't be able to defend ourselves anyway so we take the hit in defense and blame the Dems for being irresponsible and causing it.
I guess she’s exempt from any new taxes like she’s exempt from insider trading laws.
I absolutely hate these people and what they’ve done to our country...
If we don’t dismantle their positions of power,
we’re inevitably going to have a bloody civil war on our hands,
and who knows what the world will look like on the other side of that.
Roger that. Tax law can be written to be very specific. If the republicans had a brain they would submit a bill with a tax rate of 100% for everything over one million of any kind of income for a prescribed list of people,. Gates, Bloomberg, Buffet, Pelosi to name a few. All those egalitarian millionaire and billionaire that are begging to be taxed......tax um
then listen to them cry.....
This is coercion and thuggery Chicago style politics. It has to stop. We are $15 trillion in debt! Punishing the successful, job creators of this country with more regulation and higher taxes is a proven failed policy!
Handicapping our ability to defend ourselves is foolhardy and quite unnecessary. We need to cut back on spending in an orderly way. We need a leader like Herman Cain to remove ineffective programs and policies, not reduce our ability to defend ourselves.
Confiscate everything that she has over a $200,000 value and reduce her salary to that of the average American.
We'll keep her on that salary cap for the next 30 or 40 years and then decide if we want to go any further.
Sound like a deal? How ‘bout it Nancy?
Martha Stewart did time — so should Pelosi.
Personal ancecdote: I work for a partnership. The partners are what Pelosi would consider rich, making, I would guess, mid 6 figures. They get together and decide, each year, how good business has been and what type of raises and bonuses the rest of us are going to get, based on our merit. If these evil rich folks see their taxes increase and their disposable income decrease, tell me, Ms. Pelosi, is my raise going to go up or down compared to what it would have been if these dirty nasty rich folks had more discretionary income?
if we spend 780 bill a year on defense and the GOP agreed to cuts of 500 billion over 10 years, is that “gutting” the military?
IIRC, that what the SuperRINO-Rat Committee wanted...I say call her bluff.
Yeah Newt is a RINO /s
Anyone think Newt would put the military on the table for massive cuts? No I didn't think so.
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