Tax Hike Delayed

It's difficult to know what spin to put on Congress finally putting the finishing touches on a five-year extension of the 2003 Bush tax cut. On the one hand, the Republicans did manage to get this done; given that GOP governing prowess has reached the competence level of the Seattle Mariners' batting lineup, there was no small amount of doubt that they might end up "compromising" away the tax cut extension into a permanent tax increase.

On the other hand...well, just look at how brief the first hand was.

Here's an exerpt, if you're interested:

House and Senate Republican negotiators reached a final agreement yesterday on a five-year, nearly $70 billion tax package that would extend President Bush's deep cuts to tax rates on dividends and capital gains, while sparing about fifteen million middle-income Americans from the alternative minimum tax.

Republican leaders hope to pass the agreement swiftly. House consideration is scheduled for tonight, with the Senate likely to send the measure to the White House for the President's signature by the end of the week. But the package remains controversial, with GOP leaders saying it is essential to sustain a strong economic recovery and Democrats and a few Republicans saying the cuts would mainly benefit the wealthy and add to the long-term deficit.

"Keeping taxes low helps Americans find and keep work, supports families and communities with good job bases, and makes America a great place to do business for companies both here at home and those overseas looking for a place to invest," Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) said in a statement.

But with the budget deficit still expected to exceed $300 billion this year, despite a strong economy, opponents say the government cannot afford to add $70 billion more over the next five years.

"The point is the preponderance of these revenues will go to upper-income people, people who make a million dollars or more," Senator Olympia J. Snowe (R-ME) said yesterday. "It's a question of priorities."

Yes, it is. And Senator Snowe has the wrong ones.

I'm so sick of RINOs. I don't sweat Democrat opposition to tax cuts because I expect obstinate economic ignorance from them - and because that ignorance helps keep them securely and safely in the minority. But Rockefeller Republicans are like the proverbial fingernails on the chalk board, or rubbing a cat's fur the wrong way. They're like a turd that won't flush. Or like the Murphy's Law that states, "There is always one more bug." A generation after Ronald Reagan rendered them obsolete, the vestigal remnants still linger, gumming up the machine of freedom and prosperity that he built and extending one lifeline after another to a DisLoyal Opposition that might have reformed itself by now otherwise.

Why is the efficacy of tax cuts - both as an economic stimulus and as a deficit reduction tool - still a debate in this country or anywhere else? Why does an ostensible Republican senator dribble out the same tired old classist canards about "the wealthy" and "exploding the deficit"? Especially when the reason the deficit will exceed $300 billion is NOT a lack of tax revenue but a tsunamian Roman orgy of overspending? And, most pertinent of all, why haven't these cuts been made permanent? Why leave the onus on us to keep extending them rather than putting it on the Democrats to have to push for tax increases?

This stuff is not arguable. It is proven, documented fact. Raise taxes, slow the economy, destroy jobs, balloon the deficit even with spending cuts (that never materialize, but work with me here); cut taxes, grow the economy, create jobs, reduce the deficit with enhanced revenues (that are overwhelmed by even more profligate spending, but again, work with me here).

Oh, hell, isn't my point pretty much made? The Democrats will never fix their priorities because they're irredeemably perverse, but RINOs....

Well, they know where the doors are.