Because Bush didn’t have the 60 votes he needed to pass his massive 2001 tax cuts, he used the socialist/nazi/leninist budget reconciliation rules to jam them down the throats of screwball half-Americans. And that means that the tax cuts lasted for only ten years before the sunset provision set in. Bush cut rates for everyone, so if Congress does nothing, everyone’s taxes will go up. Obama campaigned on letting just the top two rates go up, while preserving the tax cuts of the middle class and working poor. To keep that promise, he needs Congress to pass a new tax bill this year. Some Democrats are getting nervous about hiking anyone’s taxes and want to punt the ball down the field. Yet, it appears that the White House and the congressional leadership are on message and intent on keeping Obama’s campaign promise. That doesn’t mean it will be an easy promise to keep. So, I have an idea. Why not cut the tax rate for 98% of Americans a modest amount and increase the tax on the top 2% modestly over what they were under Clinton?
They can make this a revenue-neutral move or one that actually adds additional revenue. That’s up to them. But rather than let the Republicans argue that a tax hike on the top two percent is a tax hike on everyone, put a bill on the floor that will actually cut almost everyone’s taxes and make the Republicans fight against it. As long as this move doesn’t harm the budget deficit, I see no problem with it. The middle class and working poor could use the stimulus, and there’s nothing wrong with closing the wealth gap a bit in the bargain.
+2
The interesting thing is, if Obama makes it about this and the oxygen in the room gets sucked up by it, the GOP will focus on this like a laser and forget to do anything to stop the sunset provisions.
Thus it is only traitorous dems we must worry about. Though to be fair, Conrad knows that his days are numbered. he just needs to look at his successor and predecessor Byron Dorgan and John Hoevan.
Conrad is behaving the way he is because he knows his days are numbered.
Massive Republican conservative defeats will have, if they ever occur, the effect of moving Blue Dogs and New Democrats to the left–either from fear or from a new freedom to be what they originally intended to be in politics.
Mainstream media reporting on your proposal: “Republicans oppose tax increase. Democrats say it’s only a tax increase on some. Who’s right? Time will tell.”
Let them all expire. No cuts for anyone.
I am going to pass this idea on to my reps – Dodd, Lieberman, and Courtney. Why not take the offensive and make the GOP even more obvious in the selective representation of the wealthy few!
Too risky with this fickle Congress (cough, cough Kent Conrad). Just let it expire. The tax hit on those who are not rich will not be much because the tax cuts for them were not much.
In this case, we should not give away our advantage of doing nothing.
Republican screaming and attack ads are not crucial to this election because they will be there no matter what is done. What is crucial is intense field work to motivate “unlikely voters” to turn out and vote for Democratic candidates. And to have a rapid response team that can indeed respond rapidly and deftly to Republican attacks. Of those, field work is the most important.
Save tinkering with taxes until there is a strong progressive Democratic presence in Congress. To consider this right now, just like the deficit commission, is to divert attention from get employment moving again in the economy. Prosperity has a way of making tax changes easier.
Oh, the naivety is so cute, wondering if the GOP will respond to sensible proposals with even a grain of rationality (or sanity)!
Because in GOPer land, “tax cuts” only mean “tax cuts for the top 1%”. Everyone else has to wait for their share to trickle down like a gentle golden shower.
Let the Bush cuts expire.
Interesting thought, but could go wrong. I’d let the Bush tax cuts expire rather than try to explain another piece of legislation.
The right wing is always longing for the 1950s–they loves them some John Birch and KKK–so why not knock the tax rates back to the levels they were, say, in 1955? A simpler, MUCH more moral time. I wonder how fast the national debt would start to be paid off then?
I figure there’s about as much chance of turning the tax rate clock back to the ’50s as Obama has of partially removing Bush’s tax cuts, given our exceptionally venal, cowardly legislators.