by Jules Witcover

After all the huffing and puffing by the Democrats over how the Republicans are holding the middle-class tax cuts "hostage" by refusing to cut the taxes of the rich, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has decided to hold off a showdown vote on the fight.

Reid has announced he will not call up until after the November elections legislation ending the Bush cuts for millionaires and billionaires while extending them for earners of $250,000 or less, both slated to lapse at the end of the year.

The decision represents a tactical retreat by the Senate Democratic leadership that earlier had indicated a willingness to force Republican senators to go on record before Election Day defending the cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

A Reid spokesman blamed the decision on continued Republican opposition, denying the Democratic majority even a single vote that might have produced the 60 for the super-majority now needed in the Senate for action.

The Republicans were quick to assail Reid for drawing back. A spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, "It's odd to complain about a lack of cooperation on a bill that doesn't exist." Turning the Democrats' argument of obstruction back on them, he added: "We hope Democrats, who have yet to actually introduce tax legislation to prevent tax hikes, won't hold it hostage to their burning desire to raise taxes on small businesses and families in the middle of a recession."

The latter comment was blatant hyperbole. The Democrats' pointed objective is to maintain the Bush cuts of 2001 and 2003 for the middle class and small business, while carving an estimated $700 billion from the federal deficit by denying the rich continued relief on annual earnings over $250,000.

In a sense, Reid's action pulled a rug from under President Obama, who at a series of recent campaign rallies had taunted the Republicans with the allegation of "holding hostage" the extension of the middle-class tax cuts, by refusing to accept an end to the continued tax break for the two percent of the largest earners.

Some Republicans are continuing to argue that all the Bush tax cuts be made permanent, though there has been talk of compromises, including a two-year extension, after which all the Bush tax cuts would be dropped. But the minority has steadfastly argued that the current economic stagnation is no time to raise anybody's taxes.

The prospect of painting the Republicans as defenders of the rich, especially in the wake of the highly unpopular Wall Street bailouts, has been viewed by the Obama administration as one of the most hopeful ways to detour anticipated deep losses in the November congressional elections.

The other main thrust of the president's campaign message for this fall, blaming the Bush administration for the economic ills and warning of public "amnesia" toward past mismanagement, hasn't seemed to get much traction. Public impatience and anger, as expressed most conspicuously in tea party rallies and support for anti-establishment candidates in this year's primary elections, has held center stage in the public debate.

In the end, the Democrats apparently decided that the outcome of a pre-election vote on the Bush tax cuts was too uncertain, and it was better politically to wait until after the congressional elections to resume the assault, which some Republicans have complained is a return to "class warfare" between the parties.

Reid's chief deputy in the Senate, Sen. Richard Durbin, reflected the political uncertainty in the whole discussion by telling reporters: "The reality is we are not going to pass what needs to be passed to change this either in the Senate or in the House before the election. If you bring it up and don't pass it, does that help you or hurt you? If you don't bring it up, does that help you or hurt you? You can argue it round, you can argue it square. But the reality is nothing's going to happened before the election."

All of which means that the argument over the Bush tax cuts will go on beyond, confronting Congress with a key deadline when they expire at year's end.

 

Available at Amazon.com:

Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future

The Backlash: Right-Wing Radicals, High-Def Hucksters, and Paranoid Politics in the Age of Obama

The Feminine Mystique

The Disappearing Center: Engaged Citizens, Polarization, and American Democracy

The Virtues of Mendacity: On Lying in Politics

Bush on the Home Front: Domestic Policy Triumphs and Setbacks

The Political Fix: Changing the Game of American Democracy, from the Grassroots to the White House

 

Receive our political analysis by email by subscribing here



 

Blinking on the Bush Tax Cuts | Politics

© iHaveNet