The Tax Debate

Another example of how crazy politics is in this country!!

The Republicans say they will block everything - unemployment extension, the START nuclear arms treaty with Russia, immigration reform, extension of tax cuts for the struggling middle class in a time of recession. And all because they insist on extending tax breaks for the wealthiest 2% and adding that money onto the deficit which they care to claim so much about. Warren Buffet himself said the rich have never had it so good. 75% of Americans are against these top tax cuts.

At the same time the Republicans are pushing to increase the deficit by prolonging the Bush tax cuts for those that don't need it, they are saying in 2012 they are going to blame Obama.

The President makes a back room deal with Republicans. In the video clip below he explains very logically why he had to compromise. (of course a compromise I would have respected would be to find a point between the $200,000 income the Democrats are using as a cap and the Republican position. How about tax breaks for those making a million dollars a year and less. That sounds like a compromise and hard to argue with.)

Obama said he does not want to put the economy at risk to score political points. One problem with not considering political points is that the Republicans are constantly considering this and if Obama chooses not to play the game, he may lose in 2012. And example of being outplayed on this compromise: The concessions he got from the Republicans all expire in a year, in order to prevent the economy from benefiting from them leading up to his re-election bid.

The craziness comes in now: The Republicans were willing to block everything until they got what they want, even though what they want goes against the majority opinion in this democracy. Obama compromises, which means giving the Republicans exactly what they want (and more - they also got a deal on the estate tax). Now the liberals in congress are saying they will stand their ground and stand with the American people and vote against a bill that includes tax cuts for the top 2%. (25% of the money from Obama's compromise goes to the top 1% according to the New York Times).

Now everyone is saying if the bill fails it will be the liberals' fault and the Democrats will be to blame for ruining the economy. So Obama, in his not so masterful political game-man-ship set the Democrats up. He has basically sided with the Republicans and is setting up the Democrats to look like the problem. He could have backed a bill that the Democrats supported and blamed the Republicans for its failure if they voted against it. Then after the Republicans were seen as the obstructionists they are he could have made a compromise. But instead he backed a bill that gave the Republicans what they want and set the Democrats up with a situation where they need to give in or be seen as the obstructionists.

Even if the ultimate bill is the same, his political strategy sucks. No matter how much good will he shows to the Republicans they will slit his throat come election time. Meanwhile by not standing up for the liberal and progressive base of his party he is making it difficult for them to win.

Clearly there are different opinions about strategy but from my point of view Obama's strategy is not so good.

Of course the crazy part of our political system is that strategy is so key. In a logical world Americans would see that the Republicans are fighting against the opinions and interests of the majority of Americans and that they say one thing and do the exact opposite (claim to be so concerned about the deficit but insist on unpopular and unaffordable tax cuts for the ones who are doing just fine).

And that they get away with this! When a reporter on NPR asked a Republican about the tax breaks for the wealthy he responded by saying they aren't tax cuts, he said that in fact the democrats are fighting for the largest tax increase in American history. And he went on to say that raising taxes on the job creators in a recession is bad policy and shows how incapable of running our government Democrats are. And the interviewer let that explanation stand. Never mind that more money in the pockets of the already super rich are not going to create jobs. It is going to go into the stock market, overseas investments, and offshore bank accounts.