The GOP plan changes hands
I grew up in an era when the Reagan Revolution and its corporate adherents had painted the political canvas as a debate between "tax and spend" Democrats and fiscally-conservative, low tax Republicans, but Alex P. Keaton is dead (fictionally speaking), and real life has taught us all something different. The Republicans bow to no party when it comes to reckless spending, and both parties have come to agreement that deficit spending keeps the world economy a spinnin'.The president-elect is preparing us for "trillion dollar deficits for years to come," but somehow now the spending of liberals (such as they are) in Washington isn't targeted towards the full funding of much-needed social programs like Medicaid and unemployment benefits-- you know, the safety net stuff that created and provided for history's most prosperous middle class. The safety net is now "a central part" of the anticipated cuts in spending. The giveaways are now 12-figure bailouts to greedy Wall Street slot-jockeys and poorly-backed loans for automakers who've shown no initiative whatsoever to change the way they do business or mind the planet.
Prudent government spending is long overdue, but what President-Elect Obama doesn't seem to realize is that the days of pandering to voters with tax cuts went out with WMDs in Iraq. You can't have it all. Bad debt put us in the position we're in now. Obama's economic stimulus package, proposed publicly Monday, includes $300 billion in tax cuts and credits, and that's unconscionable. The proposed cuts are targeted directly at the payroll tax, which directly finances Social Security and Medicare. I'm not an economist, but do you have to be to know that you can't cut revenue when you're a trillion dollars in debt? When you're in a hole, some dead white guy once said, the first thing you should do is stop digging.
An increase in spending coupled with lower tax collections isn't even a tax cut, it's an increase. It means the government will have to collect more taxes in the future. The Washington solution is to replace toxic private credit with government (read: taxpayer) credit. We should be increasing taxes, and we should tax the people who have it to give-- the corporations and the wealthy. Fortuitously, that group has been getting a free ride for quite a long time now. Did Reagan's top-down tax breaks ever trickle down? Foreclosures, bankruptcies, and the recent collapse of the capitalist system don't seem to positively confirm. Tax the corporations. Their tax percentage has dropped by double digit percentages over three decades. Tax the foreign companies that do business within our borders without toll. Close the regulatory loopholes and enforce the tax laws already on the books.
Obama advisors admit that his proposed tax cuts and credits this week are bait to help get Republican legislators up onto the boat. His stimulus plan, they argue, will have more teeth, and inspire more confidence, if it can pass the Senate with 80 or more votes.
I swear that never in our nation's history has there been such a record of a political party shifting the goalposts in the wrong direction as the Democrats have done during this decade-- and not just in matters economic. First, they complained that it was the Majority Republicans wreaking havoc. When they took control of both houses of Congress two years ago, they blamed the Bush Administration for strong-arming from the Executive Branch. When they scored in November what will likely be 59 seats in the 100-seat Senate, we immediately began to hear warnings that the chamber majority wouldn't be filibuster-proof. And now, they're paralyzed to act unless they can get legislative support from 4 out of every 5 senators. At what point will progressive Americans stop accepting the excuses of Democrats to keep acting like Republicans?
posted by CM @ 8:50 PM
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