The Obama Administration must be laboring under the delusion that the $14.3 trillion debt can somehow be paid for with tax increases.
It cannot. And it would a foolish gambit to try.
That is why House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl are to be commended for walking out of the Biden-led White House debt ceiling talks.
“As it stands, the Democrats continue to insist that any deal must include tax increases,” said Cantor on the matter. “There is not support in the House for a tax increase, and I don’t believe now is the time to raise taxes in light of our current economic situation. Regardless of the progress that has been made, the tax issue must be resolved before discussions can continue.”
Lest there was any confusion at the White House, House Speaker John Boehner reminded the Obama Administration that “since the beginning, the Majority Leader and myself, along with Sen. McConnell and Sen. Kyl have been clear: tax hikes are off the table.”
As they should be. After all, to paraphrase Ronald Reagan, we don’t have a $14.3 trillion debt because we have not taxed enough, we have a $14.3 trillion debt because we spend too much.
Barack Obama is trying to get Republicans to accept the premise that somehow the deficit has grown on account of tax cuts. It has not.
In 2007, the total budget was just $2.728 trillion with only a $160.7 billion deficit. Now, in 2011, according to the Office of Management and Budget, the budget will be $3.771 trillion with a $1.597 trillion deficit. That’s a whopping 893 percent increase in the deficit in just four years. How can this be, when tax rates are the same?
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