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I can tell you for a fact that yesterday killing of the Omnibus spending bill will be cheered by almost every business I’ve talked to as I stated in my Examiner column today:
I submit that if a congressman, state rep or MSM reporter came with me for a week door to door; they would not dare advocate the taxes, spending and regulation that they do.
Read the whole thing as they say.
It’s not often that I disagree with Rush Limbaugh AND Sarah Palin but it is my opinion that the Obama Tax deal is an excellent deal for the GOP and the right, particularly on the political side.
1. The two-year tax cut deal as I’ve already said gives us the ability to constantly bring up a vote to make the tax cuts permanent and put Senate Democrats and the president on the spot again and again and again. (If it passes we get credit, if it fails it becomes a political issue for 2012)
2. Democrats, by extending unemployment save the republicans the tough issue of refusing to extend them. As for paying for it, there is nothing to stop congressional republicans from allocating tarp funds etc to pay for said benefits AFTER Jan 3rd. Also by not including or demanding additional benefits for the 99 week guys it takes it off the table (even liberal democrats didn’t want this extra spending).
3. The individual pork pieces in the bill can be attacked by individual bills during the next session, forcing the left to defending them. Each time the left defends said pork, it becomes an issue for 2012.
4. Thanks to Bernie Sanders filibuster an actual unapologetic socialist is now the iconic image of the left…
4a. …And of course it shows the intransigence of the whole bunch of them in attempting to block this, making the lie over the “compromise” issue. This firmly establishes the idea of democrats unwilling to compromise, (particularly to those who have voted for them in the past whose unemployment benefits are on the line) that we can play up over and over again in the next session. It will be an excellent counter to the media goes that will try to make GOP intransigence an issue. We will answer: “Oh it’s the democrats being just as uncompromising as there were with the president in December.” It shatters the media’s template built carefully over decades.
5. And finally I’d rather have the actual tax rate in place than to simply have a football to kick democrats with. Why give the economy a hit when we don’t have to.
Ted Kennedy was always smart enough to take a piece of what he wanted and then amend it over time. We may have disagreed with Sen Kennedy over issues but tactically we should be just as smart.
I’m very hard on Joe Scarborough mostly because I like him (I’m always harder on people I like because I expect more from them) but today he said something that is incredibly important.
He was going on about the hypocrisy of both right and left on deficits and said this:
“There are a couple of tea partiers who care about this (the deficit) Rand Paul and Jim DeMint,that’s it!”
Although Joe likely doesn’t know Porkbusters he has a point. The Tea Party crowd doesn’t actually trust the republicans. I could not find a single person in the crowd at the Washington Freedom Works rally who would say they trusted republicans.
A lot of the newly elected republicans in congress got little or no help from the national GOP. This was due to several factors, they were not professional pols, the party didn’t expect them to win, but also because they are committed controlling spending.
Trent Lott gave the game away in July:
the last thing Lott needs is a bunch of unwashed, Tea-Partying right-wingers coming to Washington on a wave of anti-establishment, free-market populism, and messing up the good thing he has going.
“We don’t need a lot of Jim DeMint disciples,” Lott told the Washington Post, referring to the conservative South Carolina senator who has been a gadfly for party leadership and a champion for upstart conservative candidates. “As soon as they get here, we need to co-opt them.”
But Lott is no longer in the Republican leadership — he resigned from the Senate in December 2007, mid-term, just before a law kicked in that would have required him to wait two years before lobbying the Senate. So who is he talking about when he says “we need to co-opt them”?
“We” means the K Street wing of the Republican Party.
There are an awful lot of republicans who are more interested in chairmanships and favors than controlling spending and lowering taxes (and yes they are connected). That group needs to keep the good will of the Tea Party voters who brought them over the top for now so they will play ball, but if they get the chance they will try to turn the newly elected reps.
This is going to be the fight that will dominate Washington over the next 2 years and will determine the party and the country’s future longterm and will actually have a lot to do with both the presidential elections in 2012 and if we have a tea party 3rd party in 2014.
If Morning Joe follows this story, they will have a jump on the rest of the MSM.
Gary Rosen is a colleague at WCRN whose show the RAVE will precede mine this week due to college Basketball (make sure you listen this week, he will be having Greg Fettig president of the Hoosier Patriots live in studio at 4 p.m. EST, listen online via the WCRN website here).
Today he has a column in Worcester Magazine where he talks about the city tax rate and some lessons learned:
Following the hearing, Worcester’s homeowners will thank the council for throwing them their annual bone, called the lowest residential tax rate. In the meantime, the frustrated and angry commercial sector will continue to wonder why it is the victim of our city’s business-punishing dual tax rate.
“But, Councilor Rosen,” you ask, “didn’t you join the large majority of your colleagues the previous four years and vote for the lowest residential tax rate for homeowners (a.k.a. the highest possible tax rate for Worcester businesses)?” Yes, I plead guilty as charged. However, I’m now suffering some regret as I see how shortsighted those four votes were.
Gary is what you would call an honest democrat, like many on the left he made his decision on taxes meaning well but on reflection he is having some second thoughts.
As they say Read the whole thing.
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