Posted on 12/14/2011 7:31:46 PM PST by Hojczyk
Not so much a big win for us as a big loss for them.
Democrats backed away from their demand for higher taxes on millionaires as part of legislation to extend Social Security tax cuts for most Americans on Wednesday as Congress struggled to clear critical year-end bills without triggering a partial government shutdown…
Republicans minimized the significance of the move. “They’re not giving up a whole lot. The tax they wanted to implement on business owners was something that couldn’t pass the House and couldn’t pass the Senate,” McConnell said in a CNBC interview.
Jettisoning the tax could also require Democrats to agree to politically painful savings elsewhere in the budget to replace the estimated $140 billion the tax would have raised over a decade.
In its most recent form, the surtax would have slapped a 1.9 percent tax on income in excess of $1 million, with the proceeds helping pay for the extension of tax cuts for 160 million workers. Senate Democrats have twice forced votes on the proposal in what officials have described as a political maneuver designed to force GOP lawmakers to choose between protecting the wealthy on the one hand and extending tax cuts for millions on the other.
The quid pro quo, I take it, will be the GOP agreeing to drop the Keystone pipeline provision from whatever compromise bill ends up on the House floor. Which means less revenue and fewer jobs in exchange — hopefully — for new spending cuts, or just maybe another hundred billion or so in deficit spending. Doesn’t feel like a major victory, but at least the kabuki phase of these dull negotiations is over.
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
GOP will cave on something that could not pass..what fools...
...backed away from their demand for higher taxes on millionaires as part of legislation to extend Social Security tax cuts for most Americans on Wednesday as Congress struggled to clear critical year-end bills without triggering a partial government shutdown…This didn't keep Reid from threatening a shutdown over the Keystone pipeline.
Can you please explain why there might a "shutdown" if the Keystone pipeline is permitted to be built? I don't see the connection between the two. Then again, Harry Reid isn't often the most logical person in Washington.
That didn't keep Reid from threatening a shutdown over the Keystone pipeline.
Can anyone please explain why he's threatening a "shutdown" if the Keystone Pipeline is permitted to be built? I don't see a connection between the two. But then again, Harry Reid is far from the most logical person in Washington.
Harry Reid never read Obama’s memo.
Harry ALWAYS “puts Party over Country.”
The Dems are not going to let the workers have jobs building that pipeline so there's no income for them.
This tax cut has a strong and unfair bias against people who are in retirement, or who are obliged for one reason or another to live on their investments.
I’d be willing to put up with it as the price for forcing the Keystone Pipeline down Obama’s throat, but I don’t like it. Just another typical Obama ploy.
The Pubbies put the Keystone pipeline in the bill to restore the payroll deduction thing Zero and his fellow criminals claim to want — hence, if the Demwits really want the payroll deduction thing, if they really want to be on record as wanting Americans to have jobs, if they really want to be reelected in November, they’ll tell Zero to kiss their asses and vote for the amended version.
What's ALLAHPUNDIT smoking???? Seriously. No significant reductions in government spending, cuts to programs, or changes in this ever-growing regulatory nightmare, but ALLAHPUNDIT considers this a big loss for Democrats?!?!
Folks, government is totally out of control and growing like a cancer. The patient needs major chemo therapy, but our Republican oncologists seem to think a little bed rest is all that's needed. This deal wasn't a major loss for Democrats. It was a major loss for America!
This seems to happen every time our side compromises. Our side should be demanding trillions in cuts and settling for slightly less. If that means we have to give the Democrats a few revenue increases for trillions in cuts elsewhere, what's the big deal? No. We'd rather settle for the status quo where the Democrats are already getting nearly everything they really, truly want. That's big government, also known as the status quo.
Does anyone seriously think Democrats consider tax increases on millionaires a loss? That's a simple bargaining position, so they can whine about how much they didn't get out of this deal. They already spend pretty much whatever they want and completely control the nation's regulatory reigns.
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