It appears that the irresistible force of increasing taxes on the rich from the White House has met the unmovable object of GOP refusal to consider rate increases — a fact confirmed by appearances on the Sunday shows of both Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Speaker Boehner:
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner echoed President Obama on Sunday, saying there won’t be a fiscal cliff deal with Republicans without higher taxes on the wealthy.
“There’s not going to be an agreement without rates going up,” Geithner said on CNN’s State of the Union, one of a series of talk show appearances he made on Sunday.
Geithner noted that Obama is offering the debt reduction deal he campaigned on, including an elimination of the George W. Bush tax cuts for Americans who make more than $250,000 a year.
Republicans say they will agree to more government revenues through elimination of tax loopholes, but not through an increase in tax rates they say will slow the economy.
Both parties face the prospect next year of the so-called “fiscal cliff,” a series of tax hikes and budget cuts that affect all Americans in the absence of a debt reduction agreement.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told Fox News Sunday that “the White House has spent three weeks (since the election) doing basically nothing,” and that its pending offer emphasizes tax hikes while lacking specifics about spending cuts.
Obama and his team “won the election,” Boehner said, but “they must have forgotten that Republicans continue to hold a majority in the House.”
Lucy is out there urging Charlie Brown to try and kick that ball, promising she won’t pull it away just as he’s ready to boot it as she has done umpteen times over the last couple of decades.
In the cartoon, you know Mr. Brown is going to go for it. He wants to believe Lucy. He is desperate to believe her. He continuously rationalizes his decision — a decision for which he is always sorry.
Can the GOP break the disappearing ball cycle of trickery and hold fast on tax rate increases? Don’t bet on it. If Charlie Brown ever walked away from Lucy without trying to kick the ball, his friends would chastise him for not trusting the poor, sweet girl. They would blame him for the failure of the team. They would punish him when the time came for another game by not picking him for either side.
Since Mr. Brown doesn’t want that scenario coming true, he will once again, but reluctantly, run up to the ball being held by Lucy and prepare to kick it.
What do you suppose the chances are of Lucy not pulling the ball away this time?
The only thing the White House wishes to happen out of this negotiation process is for another step to be taken towards the goals of Progressive values being writ into taxing and spending policies–of Progressivism triumphing culturally.
I have no good answers for the House GOP, as they don’t have the skills needed to fight the media battles, perhaps even without the headwinds. Sometimes you just have to fight and see what happens.
Personally, I vote “yes” for independency. In whatever form it comes.
How about you actually paying your own taxes, Timmy. You belong in jail.
Geither? Has Timmy lost his en?
Unlimited raising of taxes coupled with unlimited spending on new government handouts is only exceeded by We The Elite People of culture of corruption in Washington DC’s crony-capitalist greed and power to continue Washington DC’s flim-flammery on We The American People.
See, the problem is Our national defense has become a joke. Look at this video to see exactly what crony-capitalism is weaponizing our American military with:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEXNJZK26mo&feature=player_embedded.
(Note: a bit of levity at the end of such a sad state of affairs)
It’s no wonder our troops are “shell shocked” with dismantling of DA/DT and 19,000 Plus reported cases of sodomization and rape in all US military forces (a special report prepared for US Pentagon, kept secret). West Point has its first ever same sex marriage ceremony(12/02/2012).Lets not forget the increase in crystal meth usage in Americas LGBT community with a subsequent rise of 20 to 30% death rate due to HIV/AIDS.Also there’s “medical marijuana” usage, as well!
Yes, crony-capitalism is awarding contracts to “bundlers” and “buddies” of this administration, having little or no credentials to weaponize American forces. With this “double-whammy” wouldn’t any American military be wary and depressed with USA’s current military mission?
In conclusion: Obama will decimate all military-industrial complex, take all their funding and apply to his administration’s favorite hand-out programs…designed to hold his base in power for the forseeable future. Cheap weaponization (materiel that has a 50-50 % chance of working) coupled with demoralization of all military personnel is a guaranteed recipe for failure for both America’s standing military as well as its National Guard. Wake-up America. Geeez!!! What’s it take to get Americans awakened???HUH???Pray. Amen. Roman Empire parallels?
How about a tax surcharge for people who derive their income from the government? Economically speaking government workers are making out much better than the folks in the private sector. Why don’t we tax them at 90% of anything over the median national income? I’m sure those devoted public servants wouldn’t mind.
It wouldn’t be a spending cut, its a new tax! Who could possibly complain?
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more incoherent analogy.
One description I’ve read about the way the administration is negotiating this is that they learned from the last 4 years that Republicans aren’t willing to negotiate in good faith, if you agree in advance to everything reasonable that they could ask for, such as basing Obama Care on proposals that originally came from the Republicans, then Republicans will sprint to the right to avoid having any agreement.
So the strategy is this:
1) don’t give anything in advance so that
2) the Republicans are forced to ASK for every change you want because THEN
3) if the Republicans have to propose their own changes then the Republicans OWN those policies
And that sound of complaining is because you DON’T have the courage to put your name on any proposals. You know perfectly well that the public will hate your policies – those policies are why Mitt lost the election. You don’t want your name on this.
So you’re simply going to scream and scream and scream that the President isn’t doing his job because he won’t put his own name on your failing policies, that he won’t propose them for you, that he won’t take the fall for you.
Ah the lies keep coming from the left filth.. The real plan is to TAX THOSE WHO ARE TRYING TO BE RICH.. so they can’t.. Those who are RICH don’t give a crap.. If I were RICH, I’d reduce my taxable annual income to ZERO to piss the left off.. and I would not be able to spend all my wealth if I made ZERO every year for the rest of my life and then some.. So wake up stupid.