How the fiscal cliff fight will end (unhappily for Republicans)

http://washingtonexaminer.com ^ | December 29 2012 | B. York

[Para-Ord.45]

The word among some Senate Republicans is that a fiscal cliff deal is likely to be struck by Sunday, or Monday at the latest...

If such a deal is made, it would mean that many Republicans would be backing off their longstanding position against raising taxes on anyone, including top earners...

So a deal will most likely be done. But the bottom line is that the fiscal cliff fight will not end happily for Republicans. They will have given in on what was an article of faith — that taxes should not be raised on anybody, poor or rich — in return for essentially nothing.

[Qbert]

"As for spending cuts, particularly in entitlements, some Senate Republicans say they will press for those in January or February, during the coming battle over raising the nation’s debt ceiling.  They believe that fight will give them leverage to extract real concessions from the White House and Democrats on spending.  It’s not entirely clear why they believe that so strongly; Republicans will certainly take a beating in the press if they appear ready to push the nation toward default to win unpopular cuts"

Here we go again.

[Neidermeyer]

start saying the obvious: IT’S THE SPENDING.
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Your ideas are great ,, I can come up with great ideas too ,, the problem is that you’re denying reality ,, we have Boehner... we have nobody to voice our ideas , Obama will win anyway ... we are onboard the Titanic and we’ve split a seam from stem to stern in areas where we can’t reach with mattresses and 4x4’s ... do you want this to be Obama’s economy or do you want our boys to be on TV agreeing to this little part and that little part so that in the end and for all time in the school books our children will read IT’S THE REPUBLICANS FAULT.

[trebb]

The GOP seems to have the same “ideals”/goals as the leftist Commies - they just won’t admit it until the time is ripe to enslave us all.

[rwfromkansas]

Good point...had not considered that. It will be used as a club that “now we know tax cuts don’t work” definitely. Nevermind they do....that’s why our deficit dropped and economy grew after all until the housing crisis undid all those gains.

[rwfromkansas]

Good point...had not considered that. It will be used as a club that “now we know tax cuts don’t work” definitely. Nevermind they do....that’s why our deficit dropped and economy grew after all until the housing crisis undid all those gains.

[Neidermeyer]

We are stuck between two bad ideas. “blow it up” and lose or “throw in the towel” and lose.

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I admire your "never surrender" attitude ... however it's long past the time when you should have realized that banging your head against the wall accomplishes nothing with the pathetic losers we have in the Republican Party ,, but don't worry , let THEM crash and burn , they don't represent us anyway.. and they are powerless (with their current makeup) to stop Obama anyway...

Two years is plenty of time to get a real conservative TEA party agenda vocalized and represented in the next midterms...they've already had a good start in 2010 and 2012..

[griswold3]

Anyone paying attention knows that the end justifies the means. The end game is to destroy any and all opposition to the ‘Progressives’. Howard Dean said the pain would be worth it.

[ThePatriotsFlag]

Need to face reality here. Keeping tax rates low for perceived rich people is a loser politically. Hate to say it, but sometimes standing on principle is just flat out stupid and this is one of those times.

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No, it is time to draw the line and live with it. How many times have we compromised EVERY TIME it moves us leftward? Compromise now and it one more baby step LEFT (AGAIN!!!!). There is no compromise that would ever move us to the right and there hasn't been for years. The only solution to not moving more left is simple ... stop moving (draw the line) or turn right. Enough "left!"

[ThePatriotsFlag]

Need to face reality here. Keeping tax rates low for perceived rich people is a loser politically. Hate to say it, but sometimes standing on principle is just flat out stupid and this is one of those times.

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No, it is time to draw the line and live with it. How many times have we compromised EVERY TIME it moves us leftward? Compromise now and it one more baby step LEFT (AGAIN!!!!). There is no compromise that would ever move us to the right and there hasn't been for years. The only solution to not moving more left is simple ... stop moving (draw the line) or turn right. Enough "left!"

[Neidermeyer]

Eventually as kenyancare breaks hard the dim bulbs will figure out it is coming from them and they will abandon the dims.
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NEGATIVE , hasn’t worked that way anywhere in Europe has it? ... besides if they abandon the RATs where do they go .. RAT Lite...GOPe?

[i_robot73]

HA. What ‘cuts’? The GOP hasn’t even fought to have the Senate pass a friggin’ BUDGET, so let’s all take the 1.5T/yr deficit as the NEW baseline...Wow, some leadership.

They all had 2 yrs. to work it out, put like everything else, punted to the last minute. Now, it’s scramble to make SOMETHING work that screws over the GOP base mostly, and then shrug the shoulders saying “We got the best deal we could get.”

Boy, I can’t wait for the mid-terms already

[csmusaret]

Face it folks; no politician in either party thinks we can ever balance the budget again. If they did they would not be engaged in bitter battles about how to shave a mere $200 Billion off a deficit that totals $1002 Billion. What about the fiscal cliff which both sides fear like it was Armageddon? It only reduces the red ink by $464 Billion leaving a hole of more than half a Trillion dollars. If cutting spending and increasing revenues enough to reduce the deficit to $538 Billion will crash the economy and send us all to financial ruin how in the hell can we ever get it to zero?

[i_robot73]

Yet, I hear Boner on the mic say we need the wealthy to pay more and put up 800B+ in new taxes.

He had PLENTY of opportunities to hammer it home, instead he bends over and waves the white flag.

FIGHT for the Senate to pass a budget (NO word in 4+ yrs about THAT), FIGHT to 0-out OCare, FIGHT that the laws are for ALL Americans and make the tax cuts for all or for NONE.

Problem is, there is no FIGHT, so I didn’t and won’t fight for the GOP.

[bboop]

I’m sure they’ll work something out. Meanwhile, I celebrate grid-lock, frankly. If Obama and the Senate cannot get any of their pet projects funded, then Checks and Balances is truly working. O’s already a Lame Duck, though he can strut all he wants about ‘winning big,’ he has no power.

That will look like gridlock in Congress, but that’s fine. ‘Getting things done’ will only be O getting his way. I’m all for the Party of No!

[Pollster1]

I expect the shenanigans in DC to end badly for all Americans - far more badly overall than the economic devastation from this particular tax increase (which, like all tax increases, will be passed on to the middle class).

[Founding Father]

Hate to say it, but sometimes standing on principle is just flat out stupid and this is one of those times.

I say sir, YOU are the problem.

[bmwcyle]

No one wins.

[itsahoot]

but sometimes standing on principle is just flat out stupid and this is one of those times.

Remember how the screamers on this thread insisted it was all about the economy?

We will not raise taxes on the Rich.

or

I will give you free stuff.

So hard to choose.

[Neidermeyer]

O’s already a Lame Duck, though he can strut all he wants about ‘winning big,’ he has no power.
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BS! Simply letting things continue as they are is a HUGE WIN for O as we go farther and farther past the point of no return. The $787B stimulus is baked into the budget now ,, we don’t even know what to spend it on but spend we will...

Obama has a 42-7 lead with 2 minutes left and he has the ball on the 50 ,, What good is denying him a few yards? Is that getting us a win? Time to ditch our team the GOPe (1980’s Bucs) and bring a new team , the TEA Party (1990’s Patriots) onto the field for the next game.

[DugwayDuke]

The GOP could bring the house into session around noon on 1 Jan after all the tax rates have gone up on all the people. They could then pass a bill that:
- Restores the Bush tax rates on every one making less than $250K.
- Replaces the Bush tax rates on those making more than $250k with a rate half way between the Bush rates and the Obama/Clinton rates.

The net result is every one gets a tax cut and Obama gets a tax increase on the rich.