43 thoughts on “Let The Taxes Go Up”

  1. After Tuesday, I’m not sure it’s a wise idea; Barack will probably rickroll Boehner and manage to blame him for any pain the increases cause.

    I mean, I don’t like the idea of the hike, I just don’t think the Republicans are going to be able to avoid taking the blame.

    1. Rick C.,
      evidently, it doesn’t matter who IS to blame. So long as the MSM types ‘say’ whatever’s wrong was caused by a / the Republican(s), they’ll believe it. You did see the election results right? That was prime example of the current system.

      Personally, I keep waiting for the WH Press Clown to come out with an “X” carved into his forehead and before the day is out half the country will have one too.

    1. Those counties are mostly around Washington DC. They don’t want higher taxes; they’re merely willing to pay higher taxes if it means the gravy train keeps coming into the station. 70% of “big” is more than 90% of “zero”.

      1. Yeap, the richest counties all are fed with federal gov’t contracting dollars. The richest county in the nation is just 6 miles from D.C. in Virginia where the average income is 115,000 and 40% of the county’s income comes from federal dollars.

        Maybe since this class warfare stuff has been working so well for the Dem’s we should one up them: keep the tax rates for the middle and lower incomes; return to the Clinton rates for the upper incomes but lower the threshold from $250,000 to 200,000; create another bracket for those making over $500,000 as double the Clinton tax rates. Then, eliminate any deductions that would give them an opportunity to lower the effective tax rate.

        Nearly half the nation’s wealth is concentrated around Boston, New York, and Washington D.C. They all voted for this so I say let ’em suck it. I just don’t see the point in standing up for these people anymore.

  3. Maybe they could exchange higher rates for serious tax reform. The concept of a “flat tax” is indifferent to rate.

  4. Obama is in power. He owns it.

    Spending is the problem. Taxes are dynamic. Let them go as high as Obama wants and let the taxpayers adjust their behavior which will not be good for Obama. Give him what he wants and he will run out of people to blame.

    Until the people voting for Obama come to realize Obama is the cause, demographics will make the GOP irrelevant forever.

    Newt actually told us the solution a few years ago. Identify the issues that people from all parties overwhelmingly support. Then form a party devoted to those issues and don’t let the press bring up any others.

    Abortion? We don’t have a position on that. Rape? That’s a crime that should be punished to the limit. Abortion in the case of rape? Intelligent people can make up their own minds; that is not a part of our platform.

    “But what is your position?”

    “Rape is a crime that should be punished to the limit; My personal position on abortion, like that of all Americans, is my own. Do you have a question regarding our parties plank?”

    Don’t publish dirty laundry. Pick a candidate in the backroom that fully supports the platform and has sufficient charisma without public debates. Put him out there alone as a trial balloon and see if he or she can handle the storm. Be ready to put out another if the first doesn’t play well.

    2. Unfortunately, we have a conflict between those who believe in producers keeping their money, and those who believe in taking other’s money for themselves. There is no compromise possible between those postions.

      1. Right. That’s why it’s time to go Galt. Obama kept taking credit for the success of business people struggling under the handicap Obama imposed on them. He could not have won otherwise. He has to be discredited and going Galt is the only way that can happen. Otherwise, we will have a string of Obama’s forever into the future.

        His media enablers need to go out of business as well. This is war and it has to be won. We could also use candidates that actually know how to debate.

    3. Better: Abortion? An objective, faithful interpretation of the 10th Amendment makes that a state issue, not a federal one. We don’t have a position on that.

      2. The loss of Senate seats is directly attributable to the “Pro Life” movement, and here’s why they need to own it– At this point, everyone knows that the goal is catch a Stupid Party candidate in a gotcha moment, and they succeeded with those two. The Pro-Lifers need to have a canned set of responses to all these sorts of issues all ready, and they need to keep making sure that when one of their own succeeds in getting nominated, they are fully informed as to what to expect. That these two could say such stupid things, to not have a canned talking point ready, shows that this sort of preparation wasn’t done. Why the Hell not?

        The only other explanation is that those two were so stupid that they couldn’t remember what their response was supposed to be, somaybe we lucked out in not having to defend them for all sorts of other stupidity for the next six years.

        1. So in other words, lie. Those two just said what they believed which is in the Republican platform. I just hope that once the Republican’s start using these canned lies, that people continue to see through them.

          1. It doesn’t matter if they see through them or not. Actually it’s better they do. Then the slow realization that the game is over and they can’t be played will dawn on the media.

            This is the difference between professionals and amateurs. The pro plays the game to win. If you don’t win, you don’t get to make any of the rules.

            It’s possible that Mitt actually won considering not counting the military vote and widespread potential for fraud. But if not challenged, it does not matter. I hope Allen West is successful even though his chances are slim.

            The lefty lawyer logjam has got to be busted. Their ignorant followers are quite willing to do anything. They are juveniles and the adults have got to take charge.

  5. The Dems would have a field day. They’d be on TV every day explaining that taxes are too high, that they’ve written a bill to lower taxes on 98% of taxpayers, and that the only thing standing in the way is Boehner’s House GOP. They’d point to the higher FICA payment and withholding in every paycheck, and explain that it’s there because Boehner cares more about tax cuts for the rich than the paychecks of middle class Americans.

    The Dems have all the political leverage: what they want is popular, what the GOP wants isn’t. The only question is whether they will fold on a strong hand.

      1. It’s politics as usual. If your opponent is opposing something that is widely popular, out of allegiance to something that isn’t popular at all, you take every opportunity to remind the public.

        Imagine if Obama refused to sign a middle class tax cut until it included health coverage for illegal immigrants, or higher foreign aid, or something else that polls as badly as tax cuts for millionaires? The GOP would be all over it.

        1. It’s time to end politics as usual. You know the people that support the demagogues are infants and you’re fine with that. The adults need to marginalize those.

          The real problem is there are so few on the right that are actual adults. Sarah Palin is an actual adult, with all her faults (being human) you can’t read what she says and writes and say otherwise.

          She’s not a smooth talker but it’s uncanny how often she hits the center of the bulls-eye. Must be all that moose hunting.

    2. Jim,
      the Dems never fold.

      Even when they were the minority in the House, and the Senate and GWB was POTUS [2004 – 2006], they acted, talked and gave the Republicans hell as IF they were in control.

      The Dems never fold.

      1. The Dems never fold

        Obama tried very hard to fold in 2011, agreeing to a “grand bargain” that was mostly entitlement and spending cuts, giving up the leverage of the Bush tax cut expiration in exchange for a chance to run as a president who can do big things across party lines. But Boehner saved Obama from himself by killing the deal.

        Now Obama has his re-election, with his leverage intact.

          1. Yes, because he bumped the revenue “ask” from a phony $800B to a phony $1.2T, giving Boehner an opening to walk away. But Boehner couldn’t have gotten Cantor and the rest of his caucus to go along with even the $800B (which is why he didn’t even make a counter-offer), so the deal wasn’t going to happen either way.

    3. Congress has an approval rating of about 15% and yet nothing changed in the election. The House can be as nasty as they want, because the President always gets blamed, especially when there are two years before the next election. All anybody is going to remember is that they voted for this guy and things got worse.

  6. They’d point to the higher FICA payment and withholding in every paycheck

    So Jim, you think we need to raise tax rates to increase revenue, but you want to cut the tax rate that pays for medicare, medicaid, and social security? Pushing granny off the cliff, eh Jim?

    1. But Leland, they PROMISED that they were only going after the rich! Surely they won’t raise taxes on anyone who jut gets a paycheck!

  9. “They realized that to be in power you didn’t need guns, or money or even numbers. You just needed the will to do what the other guy wouldn’t.”

    Which is exactly how the Dems have been winning the media arguments (with a lot of help from most of the media).

    They stick together and are willing to say or do anything. They accuse the GOP of doing that which they just did 10 minutes ago. And they get away with it.

    I wanted the GOP to refuse to raise the debt ceiling last time it came up. Boehner folded like an old kite.

    The GOP congress suck, as a group, in getting their side of the debate out into the open. They are hampered by a hostile press but that’s life.

    Give the Dems everything they want in terms of taxes, but do not prevent sequestration. For once in their lives the GOP must stick totally together.

    Stand next to the Dems in a press conference, list what the Dems want and say, “We are voting for everything they ask for.”

    My guess is that the Dems will be frightened out of their minds.

    Then the GOP have to go back to their constituencies and explain, over and over, why they are forcing fiscal sanity. Stay out of Washington…go talk to the people.

    Tell them: “The Dems got everything that they want and therefore own the economy. Their plans will have full effect. YOU watch the results. If you never re-elect me again that’s fine. Want to set up a recall election? Get started now.

    But there is absolutely NO WAY I will further enslave our children. Nor will I be a part of the economic conflagration unbridled spending and socialism will cause. And I will be able to look in the mirror each day and know I did the right thing”

      1. Not quite. They vote “present” on Obama’s tax bill. But they’ve got to come up with a credible plan for tax and entitlement reform, and they have to sell it. Then, when Obama won’t bite, they’re covered. They can sit back and wait for 2014.

        1. You’re suggesting the old game. I’m suggesting a new. If they publicly and loudly vote present on every bill, how can the democrats claim the republicans are voting no? The dems will very publicly own everything.

          1. Hmm. Seems like a distinction without a difference. Voting “present” seems a little petulant.

            It’s important to lead, even if you can’t legislate. Without putting up serious–public–proposals, they’re vulnerable to the “they did nothing” argument. If you get stuff run through the CBO, you can make sure you’re on record when Obama tries to blame it all on you in 2014, and you can still manage to stop everything in its tracks.

  10. …..for the fact is that the longer you delay and patch things over by printing money and other games, the worse the pain will be when the reckoning does come.

    And make no mistake…there WILL be a reckoning.

    1. …and it’s gonna have big, bloody teeth, and it will eat anything that moves. Age, gender, monetary stature won’t matter.

      Just like running and hiding from the zombies on ‘The Walking Dead’, nobody will be safe from the Fiscal Collapse Monster. That sucker will make the zombies look like Mother Theresa.

  11. I’ve been arguing for a while that the House is in a great strategic position because all they have to do is nothing. Let the Bush tax cuts expire. Let the sequestration take effect. What happens? a) Deficit problems are dramatically mitigated even if we drop into a recession. b) Obama gets blamed for the recession, because the President gets blamed for everything, especially with 2 and/or 4 years for the electorate to forget what really happened.

    Now, until recently I’ve thought that this strategy was fundamentally immoral, because it would certainly constitute the analogue to 1937 in our Second Great Depression, and Congress shouldn’t be in the business of intentionally inflicting misery on American citizens. So it sounded like a really good negotiating position if you could bluff Obama into believing that you were crazy enough to do it.

    But we’re pretty much screwed no matter what, aren’t we? No way this guy is going to prevent transfer payments from becoming 95% of federal outlays in something like 15 years. (He thinks he’s going to be able to jolly us into spending 30% of GDP on the feds and therefore delay that by 25 or 30 years, but he’s delusional, because everybody who’s productive will simply move to Canada or Brazil.) So if we’re going to hit the wall harder and faster in 15 years anyway, why don’t we just get it over with and get some political advantage out of it at the same time? And after all, you can’t really bluff; you have to mean it.

    There’s a deal to be had here, but it’s pretty much Romney’s deal: increase revenues in exchange for real tax reform (both corporate and individual) and a plan to keep transfer payments at no more than 60% of outlays by block-granting Medicaid and means-testing Medicare and Social Security. If Obama and Democrats took that deal, I’d vote for ’em in 2014 and 2016.

    And if they don’t? Well, there’s a Reagan quote for everything. But I’m not thinking of eloquent, statesman-like President Ronnie. I’m thinking of 1969, hardcore Governor Ronnie: “If it takes a bloodbath, let’s get it over with, no more appeasement.”

    I might have to change my user ID.

    1. “Let the Bush tax cuts expire. Let the sequestration take effect. What happens? a) Deficit problems are dramatically mitigated even if we drop into a recession.”

      This is probably the easy course to get the deficits under control. Trying to make a grand bargain on sequestration will be tied to tax increases and some other scheme of Obama’s like a carbon tax or expanding spending. While the cuts to the military suck, sequestration is the best way to get cuts without major concessions to Obama.

      “b) Obama gets blamed for the recession, because the President gets blamed for everything”

      I don’t know if letting the Bush tax rate cuts expire would lead to recession but they only way people will care about Obama’s spending is if they have to pay for it. As long as Obama can play it all off on the rich people, no one who isn’t rich is going to care. Obama wont be satisfied with one tax increase on the rich, he will return to it every time he needs more money.

      And it doesn’t matter what happens, everything negative will be pinned on Republicans. The state media will be sure of that. And if Republican policies out of the House are responsible for anything good happening, you can be sure Obama will take and be given credit. Just look at how Clinton took credit for surpluses and how the media still credits him.

  12. In a previous post, Jim seemed to be indicating he thought high taxes were the high road to prosperity. So I guess he figures that if Ogabe does implement the dreams from his father–who advocated 100% taxation–we should all be rolling in clover!

    1. High tax rates are not incompatible with prosperity, see the 1950s. But raising taxes (or cutting spending) in a demand-starved economy is asking for suffering.

  13. Because I think we now live in a Banana Republic, I suspect Congress will simply ignore the sequestration law.

    Just like Reid and the Dems ignore the Article of the Constitution which requires them to pass a budget.

    Just like Reid wants to adjust the Filibuster Rules by a simple majority vote in Congress.

    Banana Republic stuff.

Comments are closed.