Posted on 12/04/2012 8:29:41 AM PST by Kaslin
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's opening bid to Speaker John Boehner, a demand for $1.6 trillion in new taxes, was not meant as a serious offer. It was an ultimatum couched in an insult. Translation:
"We won the election. We have the whip hand. Not only are you going to sign on to higher tax rates and higher tax revenues, we are going to rub your Tea Party noses in your coming capitulation."
That Boehner did not throw the offer back in Geithner's face and tell him, "Give me a call, Tim, when you're serious," suggests that the speaker feels he is holding a losing hand.
He wants a deal where the GOP agrees to higher revenues and the White House agrees to cuts in future entitlement outlays. But the Obamaites are looking to dictate terms. They want a triumph. If that means casting Boehner as the Neville Chamberlain of the GOP, so be it.
What explains their hubris?
Two years ago, Obama had to eat crow and extend the Bush tax cuts. Now it's payback time. And behind their arrogance lies a belief that the GOP cannot say no. For if the Bush tax cuts and the payroll tax cuts expire on Jan. 1, Americans will face the highest tax hike in history.
-- Every family earning up to $100,000 would see 2 percent of its income lopped off, as the employee half of the Social Security tax rises from 4.2 to 6.2. percent. The discretionary income of Middle Americans would be ravaged.
-- The federal tax rate on capital gains will rise from 15 percent to a maximum 24.7 percent, a jump of 60 percent.
-- The federal tax rate on interest and dividends will triple from 15 percent to a maximum 44.7 percent.
-- Where $5 million of an estate can now be passed on to one's heirs non-taxed, that will be cut to $1 million. And the death tax rate would shoot from 35 percent to a neo-Marxist 55 percent.
Even Senate Democrats fear this would force a selloff or breakup of family farms and family businesses at death. Yet somewhere, the radical socialist Saul Alinsky, who inspired the young community organizer, is smiling.
Why does Obama see himself in the catbird seat, though his demands are intolerable to the GOP and, absent a deal, he risks taking the country over the cliff Jan. 1?
Obama believes that if we go into the abyss, he can paint the Republican Party as having imperiled the economy and imposed tax increases on the middle class, just to spare America's top 2 percent from a modest increase in its contribution to debt reduction.
And Obama has a hole card.
If those tax hikes hit Jan. 1, he will be able to posture as the rescuer of the 98 percent by proposing to the new Congress an Obama tax cut that restores the Bush rates for all couples earning less than $250,000.
He will also be able to dictate to Boehner & Co. the tax rate on estates, dividends and capital gains that he will accept or not accept. The Bush tax cuts would be replaced by the Obama tax cuts, as the GOP is cursed from coast to coast for taking us over the cliff.
Obama believes he will then be seen as pulling the nation out of the pit into which the GOP had plunged it, simply to spare its fat cats a needed haircut.
In "Rules for Radicals," the Alinsky rulebook and Obama playbook, the first rule is, "Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have."
Clearly, many Republicans think that if they do not yield, Obama will let the country go over the cliff, blame them and portray himself credibly as the man who saved the nation from Republican intransigence over a small tax hike for the rich that most Americans support.
Yet Obama is not without risk here. As America heads toward the cliff, there could be panic selling of stocks, bonds and assets to avoid higher taxes on interest, dividends and capital gains in 2013. The economy could tank. Obama could become the Democrats' Herbert Hoover.
As for John Boehner, he must know that if he yields too much, his caucus will rebel and his speakership will be at an end.
What to do?
Forget the deal. Walk away from the talks with Geithner. Pass an extension of the payroll tax cut, and send it to Harry Reid. Pass the Bush tax cuts, and send them to Harry Reid and say:
"Harry, you are going to have to pass this extension of the tax cuts, or kill them, or send us a counteroffer. Do nothing, and you, not we, will take America over the cliff."
When Sen. Edmund Ross rose to cast the decisive vote in the impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson, he said, "I looked down into my own political grave."
Reviled by the radicals of his era, Ross yet made it into JFK's "Profiles in Courage." We are at such a moment.
It’s too bad we have people like this in America. They will fall hard when they do. They never think about that.
Let it happen and then tell the american people, elections have consequences
If Boehner fails to stand up to fascism, then the GOP is dead. Let the RINOs ( who failed to win an emminantly winable election)disappear and let some genuine patriots, real men, do the necessary work to enforce and defend the Constitution.
Obama thinks he can rule like a King via popular fraudulent “vote” and executive order. Obama needs to take Obama out behind the shed. Larrap him good.
“If Boehner fails to stand up to fascism, then the GOP is dead.”
Buy a coffin. An elephant sized coffin.
Let it happen and then tell the american people, elections have consequences >>>>>>>>>
Exactly.
Boehner does not have the backbone to say no new revenue. So we are going to kick the entitlement cuts and pay more.
But Boehner does have the backbone to screw with the conservatives so we will ride in the back, screaming to get off the bus as zer0 and Boehner take us all over the cliff.
How long until Boehner gives up my savings plan IRA & 401k to zer0, who will cut thru it like a cool breeze in July, because it was the right thing to do?
Just selling everything and movin to Belize is looking more attractive
Why doesn’t the GOP go along with the tax increases for millionaires and billionaires, but exempt small businesses where the owners file their business income on their personal returns? Obama will get what he says he wants and small businesses that are job creators will not see a tax hike. Everyone knows that this tax hike on those making over $200,000 won’t make a dent in the deficit especially with Obama’s new spending.
Lock and load.
We are going to carve ourselves out a new country, from parts of what was commonly known as “the United States of America”, and set off on the original course which that former home of freedom once steered to.
True North is still True North. The moral compass still points the direstion, though it may have been ignored for years.
The map is easy to draw. Just look at the last couple of elections, and determine what parts are designated “red” (a most slanderous designation, considering its historic political implications), or “blue”, then draw the borders, by congressional district or counties, effectively separating the two entities.
“Red” America returns to the literal and defined interpretation of the words of the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, while the “blue” areas may set up whatever kind of cockamamie crackpot socialist-egalitarian-anarchist regime they want.
Works for me.
“One Nation, under God, Indivisible” ceased to be operative when the clause “under God” was effectively deleted or ruled moot.
The GOPES never made the hidden taxes in AHCA (Obamacare) an issue that go into effect once Obama gets re-elected. Conservatives are now paying the price for this plus democ-coms will be blaming the GOPES for raising taxes of the poor
http://www.theusmat.com/
The House has already signaled they are going to do this first, before the fiscal cliff.
So much for the fulcrum of PittyPat's argument...
EVERYONE knows hiking the taxes on EVERYONE won’t fix the problem in DC. Hiking it on only RICH boogie-men won’t fix it, either, but it’ll make EVERYONE NOT RICH feel better, according to financial guru and Obama Lickspittle Warren Buffet.
so, if it’s only about making SOME people feel better, and not addressing the problem (spending), why do it?
No offense, but stuck on stupid seems to be contagious and spreading these days.
When and how did we get to the point in this country where the leeches, takers and never-contributed-a-dimers have the moral high ground over the very providers for their never-ending bitchery and outright demands?
It’s way past Galt Time....
If going over the cliff would ruin Boehners chances of keeping the Speakership, that alone would be a plus.
Michelle Bachman for Speaker.
“Just recalling Tom DeLay saying “ ... a permanent GOP majority ...” is at hand.”
Along with “Bush’s brain”, Karl Rove.
Pat Buchanan really makes it clear. We are Damned, because J. Boehner is going to cave and I truly wish I was wrong. It really is sad to have elected leaders w/out Backbones.
So?
Will not the albatross be around the necks of the Liberals?
Boehner's challenge now is to make it LOOK LIKE the Republicans are doing everything in their power to avoid the "fiscal cliff" so that when we do go over the cliff - - and we will go over that cliff unless the GOP decides to commit party suicide - - they can at least stand a chance at defending themselves.
Frankly, I don't understand why there is such a lack of communication skills coming from Boehner and the so-called "party leaders". The arguments are right there in front of their faces!
1. "Raising taxes on the people who hire and employ people is a non-starter. We refuse to go along with the president's job-killing proposal to raise taxes at a time of massive unemployment."
2. "Raising taxes on high income earners, as the president has proposed, would only bring in enough revenue over the next 10 years to fund current government spending for 8 days. That's ludicrous."
3. "The president clearly has no intention of putting forth a serious proposal to address high unemployment and the nation's fiscal crisis. He is content to loot our grandchildren now that he has finished looting our children. What's next for him? Our great grandchildren?"
The Republicans need to be unified and shout the above three talking points to the heavens, over, and over, and over, again.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.