General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: SELLOUT! This is NOT what we voted for! He ran on $250k and now is pushing $450K. Guess who is going [View all]Sekhmets Daughter
(7,515 posts)1. The debt ceiling was always going to be battle. I don't know what Obama was thinking when he threw down the gauntlet on that issue and said he wouldn't negotiate for it. Of course he will have to or invoke the 14th amendment.
2. There is no such thing as a permanent tax rate, for anyone. The only reason the Bush cuts came with an expiration date is because they were passed through the 'reconciliation' procedure in the senate. In order to do that the cuts had to have a 10 year life span.
3. The original offer didn't get nearly enough revenue from anyone, including us. $60 billion or $120 billion of increased revenue doesn't begin to address the budgetary problem, yet alone the deficit. You're arguing over whether you want to spill Coke or Pepsi...
4. If your estate is $5 million or less neither you nor your heirs have been idle. Some of the hardest working people I know have estates valued between 3 and 5 million dollars.
Public opinion does NOT elect the house of Representatives. In case you hadn't noticed, the House was not particularly popular before the last election, and while they did indeed lose some of their most extreme assholes, republicans still hold the House and thanks to the stupidity of the Democratic Party at the state level, they will continue to hold the house for at least another 8 years. It will take that long to wrestle control of state legislatures from the republicans. Redistricting and the consequent gerrymandering has locked up the House for at least that long.
You assume that the same representatives who would refuse to vote for tax hikes, would fall for the 'it's a tax cut' meme after we go over the cliff...but what if they don't? It's been argued that with everybody feeling the pain of the Clinton tax rates, Dems would have no real advantage over republicans in the negotiations. Just how long do you want to pay not only the extra 2% of Payroll taxes but the Clinton tax rate on your earnings? How long are you willing to allow the long-term unemployed to have nothing coming in at all?