Bipartisan blah
Give the Republicans credit: they can take any good idea and trash it.
Such as “bipartisanship”.
I liked it election night in his Lincoln Park speech to a wildly cheering crowd that Barack Obama also had comforting words for devastated McCain supporters, telling them that “while I didn’t get your vote, I heard your voices and I’ll be your president too.” I think all America liked that.
In the short time he has been President, Obama has gone the extra miles to encourage bipartisan support for his stimulus package. He has spent more hours with GOP leaders, hearing them out, than W did with Democrats in eight years. I think America liked that too.
So what has it gotten him or his program to revive the economy? Zip.
For Republicans in Congress, there is only one solution to economic recovery, or anything else: tax cuts.
The Bush tax cuts for the very rich is how we got into this mess. Some Republicans never forgave John McCain for voting against the $1.3 trillion measure when it was first introduced. He said it “unduly benefited the wealthy” and was “inappropriate when fighting a war”. He sure had that right (even though as Presidential-candidate McCain he fell in line and vowed to make the cuts permanent).
You probably recall the barrage of op-eds and blogs attacking the President for bucking history in a most un-American way—cutting taxes while waging war.
Ron Brownstein wrote in the Los Angeles Times that “we have always accepted heavier burdens as the price those at home pay to support those under fire at the front.” Frank Rich wrote in the New York Times “our government has asked no sacrifice of civilians other than longer waits at airport security. We’ve even been rewarded with a prize that past generations would have found as jaw-dropping as space travel: a wartime dividend in the form of tax cuts.”
I’ve never understood why the deeper in debt our country gets the more Republicans want to cut taxes. They continue to claim that tax cuts pay for themselves, when every valid study proves they don’t. Both the Reagan tax cuts in the 1980s and the Bush tax cuts led to bigger budget deficits.
The Bush legacy is a $10 trillion deficit, but admittedly, rich Americans did very well. According to the IRS, incomes of the top 400 elite doubled to an average of $263 million each annually during the first six years of the Bush term. And gigantic White House tax giveaways allowed these privileged families to pay only 17% tax, down from 23% under Clinton.
How much longer should we expect Obama to wave the olive branch of bipartisanship? His economic remedy creates millions of new jobs and offers middle class tax relief , while Republicans in Congress remain stuck on more tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy who fund their campaigns.
Seems to be that was what the election was all about last November. How did that turn out?
Such as “bipartisanship”.
I liked it election night in his Lincoln Park speech to a wildly cheering crowd that Barack Obama also had comforting words for devastated McCain supporters, telling them that “while I didn’t get your vote, I heard your voices and I’ll be your president too.” I think all America liked that.
In the short time he has been President, Obama has gone the extra miles to encourage bipartisan support for his stimulus package. He has spent more hours with GOP leaders, hearing them out, than W did with Democrats in eight years. I think America liked that too.
So what has it gotten him or his program to revive the economy? Zip.
For Republicans in Congress, there is only one solution to economic recovery, or anything else: tax cuts.
The Bush tax cuts for the very rich is how we got into this mess. Some Republicans never forgave John McCain for voting against the $1.3 trillion measure when it was first introduced. He said it “unduly benefited the wealthy” and was “inappropriate when fighting a war”. He sure had that right (even though as Presidential-candidate McCain he fell in line and vowed to make the cuts permanent).
You probably recall the barrage of op-eds and blogs attacking the President for bucking history in a most un-American way—cutting taxes while waging war.
Ron Brownstein wrote in the Los Angeles Times that “we have always accepted heavier burdens as the price those at home pay to support those under fire at the front.” Frank Rich wrote in the New York Times “our government has asked no sacrifice of civilians other than longer waits at airport security. We’ve even been rewarded with a prize that past generations would have found as jaw-dropping as space travel: a wartime dividend in the form of tax cuts.”
I’ve never understood why the deeper in debt our country gets the more Republicans want to cut taxes. They continue to claim that tax cuts pay for themselves, when every valid study proves they don’t. Both the Reagan tax cuts in the 1980s and the Bush tax cuts led to bigger budget deficits.
The Bush legacy is a $10 trillion deficit, but admittedly, rich Americans did very well. According to the IRS, incomes of the top 400 elite doubled to an average of $263 million each annually during the first six years of the Bush term. And gigantic White House tax giveaways allowed these privileged families to pay only 17% tax, down from 23% under Clinton.
How much longer should we expect Obama to wave the olive branch of bipartisanship? His economic remedy creates millions of new jobs and offers middle class tax relief , while Republicans in Congress remain stuck on more tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy who fund their campaigns.
Seems to be that was what the election was all about last November. How did that turn out?
posted by Victor Kamber | 1:36 PM
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