Politicklish™

FT.com / US / Politics & Foreign policy – Obama’s promise to end tax cuts for rich unravels.

Opinion: Health Care Lawsuit Tests Basic Constitutional Principles.

Let’s start with taxes. If today’s low rates expire at year-end per current law, that would at a stroke reduce after-tax income for every working American, the average reduction being 3.3% according to the Tax Policy Center. Do the math: 94% of income goes to consumption, and consumption is 70% of gross domestic product. All else being equal, if the Bush tax cuts don’t get extended, that’s a 2.3% hit to 2011 GDP. That means instant double-dip recession, starting at midnight, Dec. 31.

Why won’t the Democrats who control both houses of Congress switch off this doomsday clock? It’s because Democratic leaders and the Obama administration want to roll the dice for the sake of ideology, by giving tax relief only to the middle class while letting rates rise for higher earners. A growing number of Democratic dissidents have joined with Republicans in insisting that, in this weak economy, it’s more prudent that relief be given to all Americans.

Some have even undergone a supply-side conversion. Forty-seven Democrats have sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi citing the urgency of preserving low tax rates on dividends and capital gains for the sake of more job-creating capital formation.

Donald Luskin: The Trade and Tax Doomsday Clocks – WSJ.com.

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Bielat is 35 years old, a Marine who spent four years on active duty and is now a major in the Reserve. He’s a graduate of Georgetown University with a master’s from Harvard and an MBA from Wharton. He’s devoted a good portion of his professional life to manufacturing the high-tech robots that defuse improvised explosive devices in Iraq and Afghanistan. In other words, he’s a serious man.

In the spring and summer of 2009, Bielat watched in dismay as Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress pursued one big-government initiative after another. He began to think about running but didn’t make a final decision until Jan. 19, when a certain Republican won election to the Senate from Massachusetts — and did it by winning in Frank’s district. “When Scott Brown won the 4th Congressional District, it became clear that not only could a Republican win here,” says Bielat, “but there was a case to be made nationally to donors and supporters that this is winnable.”

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via A GOP unknown is in striking range of Barney Frank | Washington Examiner.

Economy still needs reinforcement: Geithner.

Obama breaks out the chalkboard | The Blaze.

“Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, Karl Rove, theyre all warning you of the horrendous impact if you support this legislation,” President Barack Obama said in March about his health reform, but “I am actually confident . . . that it will end up being the smart thing to do politically . . .”

Unfortunately for the president, it turns out ObamaCare is not the wind filling the sails of Democratic candidates and propelling them to victory. Rather it has become a reef on which many of their electoral hopes will founder.

Pollster.com reports health-care reform is less popular today than it was when it was passed in March. And it wasnt particularly popular back then.

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Americans stubbornly resist this landmark legislation in part because virtually every major claim about its benefits is turning out to be false—and people recoil when misled.

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via Karl Rove: Democrats and the Health-Reform Albatross – WSJ.com.