I first met Raul Labrador back in 2010 after he won his first primary. His Democratic opponent, Walt Minnick, outspent him and had the backing of the local Democrat-media complex – naturally. Nevertheless, he won easily.
Labrador is a good, Tea Party GOP representative who is not given to such language, so this was a bit of a surprise. Perhaps it’s time for the rest of the GOP to take notes…
With so much riding on the fiscal cliff talks, I figured there would be tremendous interest in knowing just what House Speaker John Boehner and President Barack Obama said to each other on this topic last week. You’ll be delighted to know that I had planted a secret microphone (OK, actually 3 or 4, but who’s counting? I’ve got this great technician, goes by the initials J.S.) and this is what I learned:
I hate raising taxes. I find high tax rates immoral. However, we lost the election. An increase in revenue is inevitable. What’s perverse about this whole episode is that if we fall off the cliff – Democrats will get everything they want. They’ll get their tax increases, their revenue, and defense cuts. They would complete their decade-long project of ending the Bush Tax Cuts and gutting of the Pentagon. They have no incentive to meet us halfway, or negotiate in a meaningful way to make sure the markets don’t tank. They don’t need to. They won. In the meantime, Americans should prepare for the worst.
It’s Christmas Winter solstice/holiday time – and Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett seems tepid to reject the federal-state health care exchange program, which will be instituted under Obamacare. Mitt Romney implemented a similar program, at the state level, when he was Governor of Massachusetts – which explains why conservatives were unable to make the 2012 election a referendum on Obamcare. As Grace-Marie Turner at Forbes wrote in her column on December 1o, “at least 21 states have said they definitely or probably will not set up state exchanges, with Ohio, Wisconsin, Maine, Nebraska, South Carolina, Georgia and Indiana most recently joining the opposition.” Continue reading
Is it revenge of the squishy Republicans? It sure isn’t the reaffirmation of conservatism within the Republican Party. On December 4, Matthew Boyle at Breitbart reported that the House GOP had begun purging conservatives from various committees. In a time when Republicans need strong, principled conservatives to thwart the aggressive expansion of the state under Obama, Speaker Boehner and company inanely decide that they’re the problem. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. Squishy Republicans are part of the problem. President and CEO of FreedomWorks Matt Kibbe aptly said at BlogCon Charlotte last spring that sometimes “you need to beat the Republicans before you can beat the Democrats.” Continue reading
Yesterday, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) put forth a counter-offer to the President’s politically unrealistic and economically unintelligent “plan” on the fiscal cliff. That plan, which was hammered by Heritage and me yesterday (see how I did that? I’m as important as Heritage!) seems to have been in response to public opinion on the fiscal cliff debate, which a new Washington Post/Pew Research poll shows puts far more blame on the GOP than on President Obama.
For years now, Democrats and liberals have made a direct comparison between raising taxes on the wealthy to what they were under Bill Clinton and improvements to America’s economy. As I outlined yesterday afternoon for the Tea Party Patriots, however, this comparison has a number of major flaws and fallacies:
First, the simple fact is that President Clinton spent much less than President Obama. While the Fiscal Year 2012 numbers are not out yet, some perspective is available: the federal budget went up by 60% in inflation-adjusted 2010 dollars between 2001 (the last year of a Clinton budget) and 2010.
Earlier today, I posted about the four prominent Republican Members of Congress who have recently said they are okay with raising taxes:
In a recent radio interview, Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia said he is willing to raise taxes in order to help solve America’s debt problem. Chambliss’ comments (as well of those of Senator Graham (R-SC), Senator Corker (R-TN) and Rep. Peter King (R-NY), all of whom have supported tax increases in the last few days) have inspired a firestorm of criticism from many quarters.
In 2008, Main Street was forced by Washington to bail out Wall Street through the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). Now, with the debt accumulated by TARP and other federal attempts to spend our way out of economic doldrums crushing the nation, the politicians want the taxpayers to bail out the federal government. Which leads to the following question: Why should successful, law-abiding Americans be forced to pay more of their incomes into a system that clearly will not use their dollars effectively, efficiently, or morally?
This is the great conceit of the federal government, yet proponents of tax increases ignore it. While spending continues to be irresponsible, we the people are supposed to send more money to Washington to try to balance out the effects of this behavior. Never mind that this involves trusting Congress to actually use the extra income to reduce the deficit and not put it towards new spending.
So, no, D.C. You won’t get any more of our money by increasing tax rates. If you want more money, cut spending and do tax reform. You’ll get the double whammy of less federal interference in the economy and a greater ability for private citizens to flourish. Oh, and you’ll be closer to actually staying within the bounds of the Constitution, something most federal politicians are unfamiliar with.
This piece was originally published at the Tea Party Patriots blog.
Dustin Siggins is the online content coordinator and blogger for Tea Party Patriots, and formerly a frequent contributor to HotAir.com. He currently contributes to American Spectator’s blog, Race42012.com, and RightWingNews.com. He is also the co-author of a forthcoming book on the national debt with William Beach of The Heritage Foundation. The opinions expressed are his own.