Obama running with the GOP?
Photo illustration by Brian Jacobson
By the time you read this, I hope the House and Senate Democrats have gotten over their temper tantrum and will follow their president in extending the tax rates that have been in place for the last nine years.
On Thursday, Democrats in the House passed a non-binding resolution rejecting to even discuss the tax package negotiated by President Obama and the GOP.
“We were told yesterday by the Vice-President this was a take-it-or-leave-it deal. We’re saying leave it,” said Texas Democrat Lloyd Dodgett.
Congresswoman Gwen Moore expressed her unhappiness that unemployment benefits are linked to zero tax increases for the wealthy.
“Republicans have been operating under the mantra of ‘tax cuts for millionaires or bust,’” she said. “I find it hard to believe that if we extend these for two years that we won’t ultimately make them permanent. And if we make them permanent, we’re immediately in a position where we have cut programs that help the most vulnerable among us.”
It’s not like Moore and her fellow Dems didn’t have time to work on this — the sunset date on the Bush tax rates hasn’t been a secret. By stalling on this until their majority nears its end, Democrats painted themselves into a corner and created the political Hobson’s choice they now face.
Democrats didn’t play well with the GOP when they had full control – it was their way or the highway on Health Care Reform. The GOP is making good use of their political capital while they have it, seeking overall tax relief, not targeted packages to supposed Democratic constituencies only.
The president knows keeping the tax rates in place gives families, business and investors the security to plan ahead. His press office is sending out supportive releases from economists and government officials daily. And while my good friend and editor-in-chief stated earlier this week that jobs are not created by individual tax cuts to wealthy people, I beg to disagree and argue it is just that simple.
I’m a hostage taker (Obama’s words) because I don’t have a problem with millionaires and billionaires getting to keep more of their money. I don’t know how other people getting to keep more of their own money hurts me.
Imagine a smart, savvy person with a great business idea who is in need of an angel investor. That investor will be more inclined to part with their money if they know the government isn’t coming to take more of it. In turn, that smart, savvy person creates a business and creates jobs.
Think about the performing arts groups in Milwaukee. With the certainty of having dollars in their pockets, benefactors and patrons will be more willing to donate or attend their events. More tickets sold leads to more services needed and more jobs created. It’s a win all around.
And if my getting to keep an additional $1,700 of my money in 2011 and 2012 means that someone in Mequon or Brookfield might get to keep more of their own money, I am all for it. I’m pretty confident my 2011 Federal tax bill will be the same as my 2010 bill, plus I may even get a bonus in my weekly paycheck with this one-year 2 percent reduction in FICA withholding.
Obama knows he’s on top of the liberal sh*t-list, but he continues to lobby for his plan.
“To my Democratic friends, what I’d suggest is, let’s make sure that we understand this is a long game. This is not a short game. And to my Republican friends, I would suggest — I think this is a good agreement, because I know that they’re swallowing some things that they don’t like as well, and I’m looking forward to seeing them on the field of competition over the next two years.”
So I’m not worried since Moore and the other Democrats aren’t going to let unemployment benefits lapse, taxes increase on the middle class or pass up a payroll tax reduction. They’ll stomp their feet and pontificate for the cameras, but in the end they’ll take the vote and pass the compromise.
If not, they do so to their detriment.
Here’s how it hurts you: If the very wealthy don’t pay more, public services crash. What good does it do to save a few hundred bucks in taxes if you can no longer afford to send your kid to a university that is public in name only? Or in my case, if your uninsurable schizophrenic kid ends up in the underfunded hellhole of the Milwaukee County psychiatric facility that Walker left behind? Or if Badger Care dies and thousands of laid-off workers lose health coverage? The people who made out the best in this society should be paying more for all of that and more, not to mention the immense military required to insure the flow of oil so they can drive Escalades instead of ride in trains. A policy that insures more for the rich and endless riches for generations of their oligarchical offspring is not in the interest of this country.
Fortunately, my children received very generous privately-fund (endowments from wealthy benefactors) to pay for their college educations – and they are products of the public school system. They worked hard, did what they were told to do and are know successful. Also, not everyone needs or should go to universities – we also need tradesmen and women to make the things we need.
As a former elected alderperson and making my own money since I 10, I know for a fact that public employees are paid more for the same work a privately employee person does and they also receives much better pension and health benefits. I’ll share the economic surveys we conducted in just one small city.
When my constituents could see that their taxes were being used for
essential services – picking up trash, plowing the roads, assisting the truly ill and infirm – and not building skateboard parks, replacing street signs due to a federal edict or paving a gravel parking lot that had been usuable for 50 years – they were more than willing to pay their fair share.
Did we cut some beloved services? Yes. Funding to our public library had to be cut. But we also found private funding to make up the difference, because people are generous if they are asked – not coerced.
But as long as able bodied people can draw benefits, money is spent to tell me how to feed my children and and phantom money is being printed for projects to gain political capital, taxpayers will demand their money back!
I wrote four consecutive budgets lowering taxes and maintaining core services as the chair of a city budget committee – it can be done and the taxpayers will be grateful for it.
This is way bigger than a few trims in West Allis, Patti.
According to Walker, there are two places public money ought to go: Prisons and freeways, and there’s no limit for either, even though the future lies in neither.
Meanwhile, screw the unemployed, screw the university, screw the mentally ill, stop anything innovative, find ways to hand public money to religious zealots and use the courts to force their views on everyone else, and treat public employees the way Wal-Mart treats its peons.
If you really want to become the Mississippi of the North, that’s a start.
Hear that Milwaukee? Patti Wenzel and her children pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, so the rest of you can go straight to hell.
How this moron got a gig writing what passes for “commentary” is beyond me.
Were you drunk when you wrote this comment? Jesus christ.
Wow, Ridiculous – I’m so glad you put all the thought into calling me a moron, but don’t have the guts to stand up and tell me your name. I at least have the fortitude to take ownership of what I believe.
I served on the city council of Phillips, WI, a very rural and poor community in Northern Wisconsin, with the same problems and struggles as Milwaukee and every other city.
Don’t assume things Tom.
Patti and her critics sort of got off the subject at hand here, and I’d like to bring it back.
The notion of cutting taxes for the very wealthy has always been grounded on the belief that those folks will use that money to reinvest in domestic business that will create jobs and stimulate the economy.
Remember the phrase “Trickle-Down?” St. Ron of Reagan tried that one, and, although it makes a kind of sense when you explain it, it never happened. The rich folks just bought a new yacht or a house in Aspen and did not reinvest as they were supposed to.
Bush the Younger did that too: in fact, the tax cuts that the righties and now Obama want to extend were planned to do that – but in fact, the Obama administration has created more jobs in less than two years than were created in the previous eight.
The “Trickle-Down” plan sounds good – BUT IT DOESN’T WORK!
o, why are the Republicans still fighting for it? Perhaps it has something to do with the vast sums of cash that somebody coughed up to finance the recent campaign on the “red state” side… D’ya think?
You do realize when wealthy people buy yachts and new homes with the money they didn’t have to pay in taxes, middle class workers making decent wages at Burger Boat in Manitowoc and Vyskocil Brothers Buildings in Phillips continue to have jobs. Then they go to the grocery store, where more people have jobs, who go to the mall and spend more money. Sounds like trickle down to me.
In the U.S., 1% of the people hold 22% of the wealth and the top 3 million earn more than the bottom 150 million. This does not distribute enough purchasing power to keep the vital middle class economic engine turning. It’s unsustainable, and we don’t have a backup model in case this one fails.
What I hear you saying is that as long as the wealthy continue to stay in hotels and buy yachts, there will always be jobs for those who serve them. And if those workers’ kids don’t have wealthy benefactors to pay for their top-notch educations, well, they probably did something to deserve their lack of good fortune. There’s always tech school to prepare them for those disappearing jobs in the trades, hopefully in a shop where the union’s been de-certified.
Oh come on, Patti – you know exactly what I’m talking about!
The story that Republicans are trying to peddle – as they did under Reagan – is that rich folks will take this money and develop new businesses and hire more workers. As a matter of fact, Obama has created more jobs in less than two years than Reagan or Bush the Younger did in eight years. Trickle-down is bogus!
It is a fact that we are making more millionaires every year, and also millions more in poverty – all the while the middle-class is being edged out altogether. It’s just not working for the average American.
And thank you for your wise comments, Jon Anne!