I would like to thank House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Senator Jon Kyl for walking out of the bipartisan talks on debt reduction-not that I don’t want the debt reduced or that I think that more drama is needed on the Hill.
Cantor and Kyle deserve the thanks of those of us who don’t want the budget balanced on our backs. Democrats would solve the problem of Congress’ financial profligacy the way they always do: by sending us the bill. Frankly, my tax bill is about all I can handle. Democrats say it’s only “thewealthiestAmericans” (that is one word in Barack Obama’s Washington) who would pay for their sins. But I know better.
Why can’t Democrats spend less? South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint made a great point last night on Fox. DeMint said that Democrats can’t cut because spending on these programs because spending on these programs is the essence of the Democratic Party. Spending is what it does. It was a clarifying insight.
Nobody will be surprised to note that the Washington Post’s ubiquitous and spendocrat-friendly blogger Ezra Klein attributes base motives to Cantor. In Klein’s opinion, Cantor won’t sign the tax-raising deal because he lacks credibility with the anti-spending Tea Party:
Cantor is putting personal power before country here, and in a very dangerous way. If Boehner actually does manage to cut a decent deal despite Cantor’s effort to throw him under the bus, he may not hold on as leader of his party, but unlike Cantor, he’ll deserve to. For better or worse, this is when we learn whether anyone on the Republican Party’s leadership team is actually prepared to lead.
Are you having deja vue? This reminds me of the first Bush administration, when the media mounted a campaign to get George H.W. Bush to raise taxes, going against his famous read-my-lips pledge. They told him that he would be a “statesman” if he hit us with a bigger bill for Washington’s spending. President Bush fell for it and raising taxes, as you may recall, contributed to his failure to win a second term. But I think Cantor and Boehner are too smart to listen to the spendocrat cheerleaders. It’s time to stop bailing the Democrats out by raising our taxes.