zepoodle wrote:
This is gbaji's tinfoil hat moment. He thinks the Democrats will introduce a heavy tax, say "It's for the war that Bush started!" and therefore discredit the war and the previous administration whilst pocketing the money.
Given that Obey specifically stated that the costs for the war were making it more difficult for them to do things they want to do, I don't think this really requires a tin foil hat, does it? You didn't seriously read that and think that somehow if they passed a tax to pay for the $40B/year cost of the war that they wouldn't take advantage of lower deficit figures to push for more spending for things they want? Cause that's kinda exactly what he said they wanted to do...
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Bush did the exact same thing.
If by "exact same thing", you really mean "the exact opposite thing", then yes.
Could you show me where Bush passed a "heavy tax"? I thought he passed a heave tax cut that we couldn't afford (you know, added to the deficit and all that...). Maybe I missed something...
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There's only a fuss because now the Democrats are doing it. Ignoring the fact that everyone does it; that's how wars are paid for. With taxes.
Sure. Look. Both "sides" use the deficit as a lever to push their own economic agenda (with some derails along the way sometimes of course). You have to understand that there are two axis and two directions on each. There's "taxes" and "spending". It's easy to lower taxes and hard to raise them. It's easy to increase spending and hard to lower it. Which wouldn't be a problem except that if the two don't match, we end out with a deficit. So "increased spending" is easy, but is linked to "raising taxes" which is hard. On the other hand, "lowering taxes" is easy, but is linked to "cutting spending" which is hard.
You are correct in one way though. Both parties "do it". If "do it" means create a deficit and then use it to push for the harder of the two linked actions.
Republicans pass big tax cuts (easy). In the process, they create a deficit because it's harder to cut spending, right? They then hope to use the fact of a deficit and the need to "balance the budget" to get people to at least stop demanding more spending and perhaps actually cut some as well.
The Democrats do the exact opposite. They pass big spending increases (also easy). In the process, they create a deficit because it's harder to increase taxes, right? They then hope to use the fact of a deficit and the need to "balance the budget" to get people to accept a tax increase.
All the jockeying and labeling and whatnot are just moves in that game. At the end of the day though, one side wants to increase spending and taxes and the other side wants to decrease spending and taxing. The tools they use to do this are identical, but the end objectives are radically different. It might be handy to make note of those differences when making a judgment...
