Obama Sounding Less Than Shermanesque On Bush Tax Cuts

He wants the middle class tax cuts extended, and says we have to do "whatever is necessary" to get job creation going. Possibly necessary, in his telling: Some kind of a deal in which neither Republicans nor Democrats (nor Obama) gets 100% of what is wanted.

This is what I guess Weiner was reacting to.

President Barack Obama called Democratic leaders to the White House Monday in hopes of advancing a year-end bipartisan compromise to extend expiring tax cuts for all Americans and renew jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed.

...

Obama signaled a looming deal during a speech in North Carolina Monday, saying he would cede ground in his positions to help Republican and Democratic lawmakers work out a deal.

"We've got to make sure we're coming up with a solution, even if it's not 100 percent what I want or 100 percent what the Republicans want," Obama said.

Obama seemed to signal he was backing off, rhetorically at least, his previous position that we ought to tax people at higher rates even if that actually results in a net decrease in government revenue. Increasing taxes on businesses and the wealthy, he had previously suggested, was a good in and of itself even if in practical terms it brought in no greater revenue (or even decreased it).

Now he implies that a tax cut for the wealthy isn't necessarily a bad thing, except we can't afford it "right now." Of course he doesn't explain why we can afford all sorts of other things we can't afford "right now," like ObamaCare and the Non-Stimulative Stimulus or endless bailouts for the states so that they are not forced to reduce government workers' pay and benefits. (And that is 90% of what these bailouts are about -- not "services," but salaries for current government employees.)

posted by Ace at 04:20 PM

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