Opposition to almost all taxes has been the defining characteristic of the Republican Party for several decades. At least as far back as the late 1970s, the Republican Party has identified cutting taxes as the key to solving almost any economic problem. For Republican ideologues the best way to stimulate the economy, create jobs, balance the budget, bring people out of poverty, improve education, develop a better health care system or virtually anything else has, for some time now, been to cut taxes.
This has been an important part of the Republican Party's electoral appeal, and indeed message, for most of this time. Most people don't like paying taxes; and it is not hard to convince people that they are taxed too heavily, despite the ample evidence to the contrary. Similarly, in a country as large and complex as the U.S., it is never difficult to find government and bureaucratic waste to use as "proof" that tax dollars are being wasted.
For more than a generation, Republican candidates for almost every office have campaigned on the need to cut taxes and have successfully intimidated the Democratic Party into keeping silent regarding the need for taxes in a modern state. This anti-tax rhetoric has contributed to the current debt problems facing the U.S. as decades of increased spending while reducing taxes, including during periods when the borrow-and-spend Republicans were in power, have put the U.S. deep in the red. That the result of cutting taxes and increasing spending is increased deficits should come as a surprise to nobody, but nonetheless demonstrates the danger of the extreme anti-tax position of the Republican Party.
During the last two or three years, the Republican Party has sought to link their anti-tax sentiment to concern about the debt and an attempt to present themselves as the party of fiscal responsibility. The latter effort has occurred despite the massive debt which was created, and largely ignored by Republican policy makers, during the presidency of George W. Bush. The current negotiations around the debt ceiling have demonstrated once again that Republican concerns about the debt end when any discussion about raising taxes begins. President Obama's proposed deal features enormous concessions to the Republicans, but it will not win Republican support because it also calls for slight tax increases.
Obama's penchant for compromise, often as a good in of itself, rather than as a means of achieving a policy goal, has angered progressives who believe the President is giving away too much to the Republicans. However, Obama's offer has also put the Republican congressional leadership in the position of either convincing their more radical members to support a proposal like Obama's or concede that the Republican Party has become, on economic issues, little more than a cheering squad for tax cuts with no ability to govern, even when they stand to win.
The most recent demonstration of anti-tax fanaticism by the Republican Party may present an opportunity for the Democrats, and even become something of a liability for the Republican Party. While calling for tax cuts remains a reliably winning campaign tactic, current Republican actions demonstrate more clearly than ever how the anti-tax view of that party undermines their ability to govern and exposes the hypocrisy of their alleged concern over the deficit. If the Republicans reject a debt ceiling deal that tilts far more heavily towards spending cuts than revenue increases, it will make it clear to voters that the Party is not serious about reducing the debt, but sees that as secondary to fighting taxes.
The Republicans have been successful running on anti-tax platforms for years, but in 2012 they will have to run on a position that cutting taxes is such an extreme priority, on which there can be no flexibility, that it is even more important than addressing the other issues which, the Republicans themselves, have said threaten the future of our country. At its core, the anti-tax agenda of the Republican Party has always been about shifting wealth from the poor and middle class to the wealthy, but it will be more difficult to conceal this if the Republicans continue their inflexibility on the need to increase revenue to address long term U.S. fiscal problems.
For several years, the Republicans have sought to convince the American people that the debt is the biggest economic problem facing the U.S.. This may or may not be true, but enough Americans believe it now that the Republicans may face electoral consequences if they continue to eschew any compromise on the debt ceiling that includes any efforts to increase revenue. It is possible to believe that cutting taxes is always the right thing to do; and it is easy to point to the debt as an enormous problem facing the U.S., but doing both at the same time, as the Republicans have tried to do, is becoming increasingly less possible.
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Brent Budowsky: Obama Is Not RFK
Free-market ideologues, privatization fanatics, deregulation proponents, all, they deny any role for government in commerce whatsoever. They seek a Plutocracy by default. The perfect marriage of government and wealthy corporations is their goal. Combined with a conservative "social agenda", complete with hyperbolic patriotism, old fashioned religion, and an extreme reverence for "tradition" and we have, regretfully, America's version of Fascism.
True for people with intelligence who understand the meaning of the word "hypocrisy." But for the majority of the ignorant right, who have bought the argument from their ignorant leaders that running the US government so no more complex and no different than running your household budget, your analogy is probably to complex to understand. Even faced with overwhelming evidence that the Bush tax cuts severely cut tax revenue and greatly contributed to the national debt, republicans will still argue that cutting taxes INCREASES revenues. The math just doesn't add up. But try convincing them of that.
This is like saying, if I reduce sales transactions in my business, I'll increase my bottom line profits. If that ludicrous thought process could ever be true, If I closed the business, my profits should increase exponentially according to the right. Thinking along the same lines, if we eliminate all taxes, tax revenue would increase exponentially.
It's completely nonsensical yet we're supposed to respect that as their opinion. I think not . . .
http://www.fsmitha.com/h2/ch15wd.html
The rich claim they want a flat tax, but the federal payroll would be flat, if the rich hadn't capped it to exclude most of their income.
The rich claim that John Linden's "Fair Tax" (a national sales tax) is the way to go, but when Clinton imposed a sales tax on luxury goods in the early 1990s, the rich lobbied furiously, until it was repealed.
Then rich don't want to pay any taxes at all. The rest of us would rather not have to pay them either, but it is only the rich who have the influence to have it their way.
The logical outcome of starving a government of revenue is to force it into bankruptcy. When that occurs, the liabilities associated ed with benefits and pensions for government workers, and retirement trust funds like Social Security and Medicare can be negated, and government assets can be sold off to those with the wealth to buy them.
Then we can all become serfs to our feudal masters owning the roads, the libraries, the police and fire departments -- and our minds, since only propaganda reinforcing this hegemony will be permitted to be dispensed in our schools and libraries. as is already the case with most of our media.
Don't look now, but it's already happening. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/pickles_n_pops/debt-ceiling-showdown-james-clyburn_n_890116_95731214.html
Now If I got a politician to pass a law saying to demand a portion of your income is that theft...?
Income Tax is theft, We didn't even have an income tax until 1913... Coincidentally it was the same year the Federal Reserve was concepted
We can not forget the role 'blue dog' centrist dems played into supporting republican administrations and their corporate masters.
Since 2007 blue dog dems have controlled the senate - it's where all progressive legislation go to die. We saw this with 2009 Stimulus Plan, HC Reform, Financial Reform where strong progressive bills went to senate and got watered down, then republicans say 'govt don't work.'
So we dems need a better narrative - republicans tell a better story and they stick to that story no matter what the questions are: CUT TAXES. Dems are all over the place.
and prvatizing ALWAYS costs the government MORE money and LESS service results despite the higher costs like the part of Medicare that was privatized then resuklted in a 20% higher price
The funny thing is they may have created an "anti-tax" narrative that will continue.
"Privatized" things still use alot of taxpayer dollars and the narrative they developed so well will eventually be used against that.
So the Republican plan is to cut taxes so that, in the end run, we can all pay more for the same services we used to get from the government.
Yes, we can and should reduce spending and we should probably raise revenue a bit as well. How can we possibly solve problems without using all of the tools at hand? The notion that we're broke is just rhetoric, our debt to GDP isn't much different that it has been at other times in the past, all this is is Fear Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) spread by the Republicans to try and instill fear.
So the real argument is what we spend on, Repubs would have us believe that middle class and poor are the culprits. Democrats are more confused on the message, as usual.
Drop defense spending, stop corporate welfare, drop subsidies to agri, oil and other industries and we could save 300 billion a year without trying.
Legislate that any state taking more than 90 cents of federal spending for each dollar in taxes paid must present a plan to the nation on how they will turn their state around.
Increase taxes on the top 1% (which I'm in) back to Clinton levels, close corporate tax loopholes, increase capital gains tax which only benefits the rich, and lower the corporate tax rate (but plug the holes).
Drop the medicare limit on contributions and social security.
It's not hard to find ways to fix things without making grandma lose health care and poor children put out on the streets. But that would require open discussions of people looking to find solutions, not just win the next election.
I'm not in the top 1% but earn enough to actually pay taxes (which automatically puts me in the top 50%!). I don't mind paying more but I also don't want to throw good money after bad. We are a train wreck waiting to happen and none of our elected officials give a damn about anything other than getting re-elected.