Tax Increases vs. Real Tax Reform

Note: This first appeared in Breitbart.com's Big Government.

President Barack Obama in December succeeded in getting Congressional Republicans to further sully their already tattered Party brand - by getting them to go along with the government taking even more of our money. For the President and his Democrats - that’s a twofer.

At the end of a long run of terrible policy and messaging decisions - and to avert the self-inflicted “fiscal cliff” - most Senate Republicans and a RINO House bloc voted to keep in place an increase in tax rates on the nation’s job creators. Oh - and on anyone paying payroll taxes.

With all due respect, most Americans are left to think that Republicans thus largely surrendered being the Less Taxes Party. After all, they agreed to the “fiscal cliff” rate increases they then only partially “averted.”

Meanwhile, the President is just getting warmed up. Now he wants to further lighten our wallets by closing tax code loopholes. An idea he rejected just two months ago when Republican Speaker John Boehner proposed it.

That was then. Now that the President has his rate increases, he’s back for more even money via the route he just recently dismissed. He’s the Leviathan’s perpetual Oliver Twist. This is his warped definition of “tax reform” - raised rates, closed loopholes and entirely new taxes (beware the Value Added Tax [VAT]).

But we need not cede to the Left the term or the idea of “tax reform.” Congressional Republicans need to immediately put forward proactive, economy-positive ideas. Real reform is simple - and simple to message. What we should do is:

1. End all paycheck withholding, and

2. Move Election Day to April 16

Or at least withhold taxes from every other paycheck - so that people would see payday-to-payday just how large the government bite is.

Meanwhile, the tax code is a tens-of-thousands-of-pages nightmare mess. Democrats and RINOs together grew it over decades - and love its complexity. Average Americans cower before the Labyrinth. And Big Government Minotaurs can hide in the legal thicket as many breaks for their friends as it takes to keep them perpetually elected. The code - and the American people - are crying out for reduction and simplification.

Republicans need to draw the line - no more net increases in money to the government. The Grand Old Party must begin anew - rebuilding their brand on taxes (and spending). Closing loopholes is a good thing - cutting taxes elsewhere at least dollar for dollar to offset is a better thing.

The President claimed he only raised taxes on the Top 2%. Payroll employees are now forlornly realizing that wasn’t true. A $30,000 employee was in fact hit harder by the President’s “fiscal cliff” “tax the rich” deal than was a $500,000 one. Exploit the Democrats’ policy and messaging dishonesty - or incredible, serial wrong-ness.

Doing so sets the table for the hardest part - explaining to America’s $30,000 employees that Republican policies are better for them than Democrats’. The Democrats say otherwise, but can you really believe them anymore?

They said ObamaCare would reduce your health insurance premiums - and that wasn’t true. They said if you liked your insurance, you could keep it - and that wasn’t true. They said the $1+ trillion “Stimulus” would keep unemployment below 8% - and that wasn’t true. Blather, rinse, repeat.

Republicans must make their policies mean something to Americans. They have made it infinitely harder on themselves by ruining their Less Taxes, Less Spending brand. Their policy and messaging fuzziness has allowed Democrats to in the alternative distinctly define them. The GOP must recapture its mantle by offering to the American people real, meaningful solutions.

Tax reform is a golden opportunity to do so.

5 members like this

Comment

You need to be a member of Tea Party Nation to add comments!

Join Tea Party Nation

Comment by Erick Vasquez on February 1, 2013 at 8:10pm: what needs reforming -<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/u9dGHuRExiM?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Comment by Frank Chance Chenoweth on January 31, 2013 at 8:54am: You hit the nail on the head, Ben! Obama knows what he is doing. He took Politics 101, and he is arming his friends: the Muslim Brotherhood . . . ! --FRANK NITTY

Comment by Ben Gedzyk on January 30, 2013 at 5:08pm: Frank,
I know the history of this deal, but riddle me this. If i agree to sell you some weapon today , next week you change politics and decide you hate me and want me dead, should I go through with the deal and let you have the weapon? Politics 101, don't arm your enemies, or your allies enemies. Either Obama missed the class or we really don't know who's side Obama is on.........actually, I think we do, and it ain't ours!

Comment by Frank Chance Chenoweth on January 30, 2013 at 11:12am: Ben,
The reason this happened with Egypt was that this deal was agreed to in 2010 when Mubarak was in power. He was a staunch ally of the U.S.--until Obama, who has six members of the Muslim Brotherhood in his cabinet, helped the Brotherhood topple his regime. But the sale of weapons is still going through (per that 2010 deal). Obama, obviously, wants the Muslim Brotherhood to have these weapons. --FRANK NITTY

Comment by Ben Gedzyk on January 29, 2013 at 5:06pm: So, let me see if I understand this correctly. The government (and I blame both sides since Congress does hold the purse strings) is so broke they have to borrow billions a day just to pay interest on trillions they borrowed, still want to GIVE away hundreds of millions in F16s, Abrams tanks, and personell carriers to Egypt, controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood, who want us dead, and in order to give this and many other gifts around the world to our enemies, our government wants to raise taxes on us who they never asked if we want to be so generous in the first place! Hmmmmm...... Oh ya, I'm in ! I say vote them all out at all coming elections and start fresh!

Comment by Frank Chance Chenoweth on January 29, 2013 at 1:16pm: The only way to remove Obama, Debrajoe, is to impeach and convict him. Not likely to happen. And those "lifetime" politicians are really hard to root out. Look at Lugar in Indiana. He didn't even live in the state since 1978, but he wasn't voted out until last year's Republican Primary. Think of that--the voters kept a guy in office for 34 years who didn't live in their state! Amazing! --FRANK NITTY

Comment by Doug Nicholson on January 29, 2013 at 1:04pm: If the majority of the people would get behind the FairTax, we could solve the unemployment AND the debt problems in just a few years. If you aren't knowledgable about it, you can go to:

http://fairtax.org

Comment by Debrajoe Smith-Beatty on January 29, 2013 at 12:55pm: The first thing we must do it remove Obama, and at every election, vote out the career politician.

Comment by Herb Irish on January 29, 2013 at 12:53pm: O'Bummer is looking in every nook and cranny for something to tax. He simply cannot underwrite the enormous cost of his socialist agenda with the government's current revenue. I would like to say "Thanks, for nothing" to the idiots who re-elected this charlatan, but they don't read this website. Fact of matter, most of them don't read.

Comment by Elizabeth Baldwin Letchworth on January 29, 2013 at 12:35pm: Great post Seton. The GOP needs to watch out for the Dems spin machine and the WH as they re-brand tax increases as "pay your fair share"

Watch the newest way the Dems might try to push tax increases via the "No Budget, no pay" debt ceiling bill. We need to be very careful when it comes to pushing a budget resolution if the Dems use it to create a reconciliation bill.

http://www.gradegov.com/news.php?id=221