Maybe the tax debate will shift

The swirling currents in the income tax debate in Washington are getting even murkier. On the one hand, John Boehner has said that Republican would go along with stopping the tax increase on just those earning under $250,000 as obama wants if that is all that can be obtained. for his part, Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell has apparently disagreed saying that all of the tax increases need to be stopped since we are in the middle of a recession. while the Republican attitude is interesting, the real question is what the Democrats will do. After all, the Democrats control both houses by hefty margins. Indeed, but for the cowardice of the Democrats, they could have passed the tax bills with no involvement by the Republicans at all.

Earlier this year, the Democrats decided to forego passing a budget for this fiscal year. The Democrats were afraid to actually set forth for the public the amounts that they intended to spend in this year. They knew that a listing of the trillions of dollars to be spent would set off another wave of revulsion by the American people. The problem for the Democrats, however, is that by failing to pas a budget, they gave up the ability to use reconciliation to pass tax and budget items. that means that to pass a bill in the Senate, there needs to be a sufficient majority to overcome a filibuster. So, because they were cowards, unwilling to tell the truth to the American people about their spending intentions, the Democrats gave up the ability to pass a tax bill with 51 votes and changed that to 60 votes being necessary. So they did this to themselves.

Within the Democrat caucus, however, there may not even be a majority available to pass a bill that would only stop some of the pending tax increases. Enough Democrats recognize the stupidity of raising taxes in a recession that they may join the Republicans in keeping all tax rates frozen at current levels. Particularly since the tax increases that obama wants will hit small business income particularly hard, there are many Democrats who realize that the impact on job creation will be severe. There are at least four Democrat senators who have announced that they support prevention of the tax increases for all Americans; they do not want to further damage the economy with tax increses on small business.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Right now, it appears that the obamacrats are more interested in using the tax issue for political gain rather than worrying about the impact on jobs and the economy. Truly, it is disgusting to watch. People are suffering all over the country and Obama wants to take steps that will cut jobs further. Even on his other proposals, Obama wants to take steps to raise taxes on energy producers that a non-partisan study estimates will cause the loss of 150,000 jobs in the economy and the reduction of nearly a third of a trillion dollars of GDP. Indeed, Obama's plan has the effect of giving non-American energy producers a built in advantage over American ones. Many have speculated that Obama does not understand the basics of economics. In truth, I hope that is true. I prefer thinking of the President as a man who just does not understand how badly he is attempting to damage the economy rather than as someone who is doing it intentionally.