Tax Plan Fairness vs “Class Warfare”

19 September 2011 |permalink | email article

It’s not surprising that Republicans on Sunday became hysterical about the notion of a new minimum tax rate for millionaires as “class warfare,” saying that the “Warren Buffett” proposal by President Obama may be intended to portray Congressional Republicans who resist it as being callously indifferent to the hardships facing many Americans.

Rep. Paul Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman, ripped the tax proposal which the president will unveil today, as also weighing heavily on a stagnating economy. Ryan told Fox News Sunday that “class warfare may make for real good politics, but it makes for rotten economics.” He did not elaborate.

Democratic Sen. Richard Durbin from Illinois took direct aim at the Republican speaker of the House on CNN: “I wonder if John Boehner knows what it sounds like when he continues to say the position of the Republican Party in America is you can’t impose one more penny in taxes on the wealthiest people. I wonder if he understands how that sounds in Ohio, where people are struggling paycheck to paycheck.” Obama’s proposal has slim chance of becoming law unless Republicans lawmakers buckle. But by focusing on the wealthiest Americans the president is sharpening a contrast between the two parties in his 2012 reelection bid.

Read ‘em and weep

“For 30 years, fairly or not, Carter has been political or cultural shorthand for an ineffectual and uninspiring president who is captive to, rather than captain of, events. To compare oneself to President Carter is kind of like Nixon evoking Harding.” Jon Meacham, the Pulitzer-Prize winning biographer of presidents, to Politico and siding with a tough White House response to a new Harper Collins book by Ron Suskind, also a Pulitzer-Prize-winner, which suggests some of his own staff presented Obama as a conflicted, sometimes wavering leader. Aside from misspellings some senior aides have disputed the quotes attributed to them.

“It has all become entertainment. In the 21st century, politics is just another branch of the entertainment industry.” – Joe McGinniss, in his headline-grabbing book, “The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin.”

(Obama) has wasted far too much time trying to puzzle out how he can shave policies down far enough to get the Republicans to cooperate. The answer has long been clear. Since he was elected, the Republicans have openly said they will not work with him….Sen. Mitch McConnell, the minority leader, said explicitly that the Republicans’ goal is to deny Obama a second term. – New York Times Sunday editorial.

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