Democrats propose extending tax cuts
The Washington Times’ Sean Lengell reports that Democrats are proposing extending some of President Bush’s tax cuts set to expire in 2010;
 Senate Democratic leaders have proposed extending some of President Bush’s tax cuts for the middle class that are set to expire in 2010, a move that Republicans say is an attempt to appease centrist Democrats.
    Sen. Max Baucus, Montana Democrat, yesterday introduced an amendment to the Senate budget resolution that would provide almost $200 billion to preserve middle-class tax cuts and enhance health care coverage for poor children.
    The amendment, backed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, is aimed at extending tax cuts for married couples, people with children and those inheriting large estates, among others.
    The tax-cut extensions would have the effect of erasing a $132 billion surplus promised under the Democrats’ original budget. The amendment passed by a vote of 97 to 1. Democrat Russ Feingold of Wisconsin was the lone dissenter.
I don’t care why they’re doing, I’m just glad they’re doing it. But if they want to see me really happy, and they want to prove to me that Democrats really care about middleclass taxpayers, they’ll exempt the first $35,000 of every worker’s income from taxes. Now, that’s a tax cut, and it’s targeted towards the middleclass.
According to Washington Post’s Laurie Mongomery the Democrats will have to resort to dirty tricks to balance the budget, though;
Conrad and his counterpart on the House Budget Committee, Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. (D-S.C.), resorted to gimmicks in their plans. To achieve balance, the Democratic plans, like Bush’s proposal for next year, would allocate less than $200 billion for the Iraq war over the next two years, low by most estimates.
Like Bush, the Democrats rely on hundreds of billions of dollars over the next five years from the unpopular alternative minimum tax, which Democrats and Republicans alike have vowed to reconfigure or abolish.
And while Conrad said his plan leaves room for extending some of the Bush tax cuts, Spratt acknowledged that his relies on the extra revenue that would result from letting them expire.
Hmmm. Kinda sounds like what I heard in the 1992 election from candidate Bill Clinton promising middle class tax cuts, but within weeks after taking office, and working harder than he had ever worked in his life, he announced he just couldn’t find any tax cuts for working, middleclass Americans. I didn’t finish paying my taxes from his 1993 tax hike until 2002 – when President Bush cut my current taxes enough so I could pay off Clinton’s tax hike.
So much for Democrats being the party of the working man. I guess they’re only the working man’s party during the election season.
Category: Politics
