Normally I get incensed when Washington doesn't do its job. After all, these guys normally work only three days a week for about 40 weeks a year. But I like this year-end Christmas strategy proposed by Professor Jacobson:
I say call his bluff. If a deal which tackles deficits from both revenue and spending can be reached this month, great.I know, I know, more playing politics. But there's a practical reason for delay: this is a lame-duck Congress operating under the pressure of a self-imposed deadline. Let the new Congress take their seats, let the committee re-shuffle chairs, and set up a little breathing room to make a deal.
If not, pass a 90 day extension of current tax rates and whatever else is needed to postpone the “cliff,” and go home for Christmas to give time for a Grand Bargain which puts Democratic sacred cows on the table.
Let Harry Reid refuse to bring it to a vote, and Obama refuse to sign it. Their inaction will be the reason for taxes rising for everyone.
5 comments:
You should be dismayed, not intrigued, by seeing the Republicans race around in circles, looking for the one true scheme that will somehow undo the damage.
Next time, let's push Marco Rubio to Latino voters! Or Jeb, he also speakums the Spanish! Let's split electoral votes, but only in Pennsylvania! Let's get all the conservative electors to boycott the electoral college certification, which will somehow un-elect Obama and give the White House to Mitt Romney! Let's just secede from the United States, because nothing's more powerful than an online petition! Let's all the House Republicans vote "present" on the budget deal, and then everyone we know will blame the Democrats! Starting with the coward who voted "present" all those times in the Illinois Senate!
Fine, maybe some of the above proposals are a little desperate. But Jacobson's 90-day kick the can extension, that puppy is GOLDEN! The Dems will be so stunned by the adroitness of the switcheroo, they'll completely forget to put their own, more popular tax proposals up for a vote in January. Haw! Can you imagine how pathetic Obama will look, when he refuses to sign an unpassed law that will never be sent to him!
The best part of Jacobson's premise is that the Republicans should "call Obama's bluff." When there's a floor-to-ceiling mirror behind the post-election GOP, and the entire room can see they're holding the 3 of clubs, the 6 and 7 of diamonds, the 9 of hearts, and that extra card from the box that lists which type of hand beats what.
Hmmm...you guys (guy?) seem pretty confident of the GOP's collapse in the fiscal cliff talks. Of course, having learned that he sucks at negotiation, Obama...isn't.
Obama is pushing the same tax policy that he couldn't get passed in Congress when Democrats held a filibuster-proof majority. The same policy that got zero votes in three separate votes in Congress.
"But he got re-elected!" you say. But so did the GOP Congress and the members who swore to avoid tax hikes. Why should Congress bow to the executive branch?
I suspect this is what George Will calls "restocking the pantry of others to blame." The GOP is going to get beat up anyway - why not stick to principle and reject tax hikes you think are going to harm the economy? The next election is a long way off.
"But he got re-elected!" you say. But so did the GOP Congress and the members who swore to avoid tax hikes. Why should Congress bow to the executive branch?
Because a stalemate helps the Democrats and hurts the Republicans. Inaction kills the GOP's preferred tax rate, and forces them into an immediate series of politically untenable votes. The Democrats have no incentive to prevent this from happening, and the Republicans do.
On January 1, the Republicans move ten spaces back. This isn't mysterious. It's choose your preferred pain time. Maybe the GOP's preferred pain will turn out to be hunkering down, and trying to sell it in 2-4 years as principle. But it sure wouldn't be calling Obama's "bluff."
Obama is pushing the same tax policy that he couldn't get passed in Congress when Democrats held a filibuster-proof majority. The same policy that got zero votes in three separate votes in Congress.
And the Republicans are pushing the same tax policy from 2001 that they might not be able to get passed in 2012 on the set of "Hannity." Those kabuki show votes were supposed to hurt Obama; how'd that work out?
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