I am hoping that the Republicans will remember their anti-tax pledge. If they don’ t then they will be sorry. Judging from the past they will give in and that might be because they really idiots after all.
The GOP and the Anti-Tax Pledge
Posted by Roger Pilon
Today POLITICO Arena asks:
Should the GOP break their anti-tax pledge?
My response:
Republicans should break their anti-tax pledge only if they enjoy being irrelevant. America doesn’t need two tax-and-spend parties. One is one too many.
The post-election drumbeat we’re hearing on many fronts — some of it well-placed, as with immigration and gay rights — is aimed transparently at turning elected Republicans into tepid Democrats — as in the 1970s when congressional Republicans were known as the “permanent minority.” That began to change when the party rediscovered its roots in limited government. The no-new-tax pledge distilled that change, but it’s been undermined over the years by the propensity of too many Republicans to ignore the spending side of the equation, including defense spending.
Republicans delude themselves — and ignore history – if they think that raising taxes will lead to spending cuts. The so-called sequester’s “cuts” aren’t really cuts at all: they’re reductions in the growth of spending. As my colleague Dan Mitchell has written, ”if the sequester takes place, total federal spending will climb by $2 trillion over the next 10 years instead of $2.1 trillion.”
In this lame-duck session, Republicans should stand their ground, vote to extend the Bush tax cuts for another year, and wait for the next Congress to try to make the fundamental changes in our tax system that are so sorely needed. Above all, they’ve got to expose the zero-sum mindset that informs the Democrats’ economic vision. Yes, deficits and debt – federal, state, and local – are undermining our future. But only an expanding economy will solve those problems. More taxes will worsen them, driving us into the abyss Europeans currently enjoy.
It is obvious to me that if President Obama gets his hands on more money then he will continue to spend away our children’s future. He has already taken the national debt from 11 trillion to 16 trillion in just 4 years. Over, and over, and over, and over, and over and over I have written Speaker Boehner and the Congressmen (Griffin, Womack, Crawford) in Arkansas concerning this. I am hoping they will stand up against this reckless spending that our federal government has done and will continue to do if given the chance.
I have written and emailed Senator Pryor over, and over again with spending cut suggestions but he has ignored all of these good ideas in favor of keeping the printing presses going as we plunge our future generations further in debt. I am convinced if he does not change his liberal voting record that he will no longer be our senator in 2014.
I have written hundreds of letters and emails to President Obama and I must say that I have been impressed that he has had the White House staff answer so many of my letters. However, his policies have not changed. He is committed to cutting nothing from the budget that I can tell.
President Obama will surely waste any new revenue on increased government spending. Milton Friedman rightly noted that we are truly blessed that the federal government is so inefficient so at least they will not be able to hurt us as much as they could if it ran efficiently. Here is the exact quote:
The only reason there’s any chance of keeping government limited is because government is so inefficient and does so poorly.
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 18)
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 18) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 17)
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 17) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 16)
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 16) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 15)
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 15) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 14)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. ___________ Sen. Rand Paul Urges […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 13)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 12)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. If we want the economy […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 11)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 10)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. Dan Mitchell of the Cato […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 9)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 8)
Government Must Cut Spending Uploaded by HeritageFoundation on Dec 2, 2010 The government can cut roughly $343 billion from the federal budget and they can do so immediately. __________ John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 7)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 6)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. DON’T LET THEM RAISE THAT […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 5 on debt ceiling)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 4 on ‘TEFRA Debacle of 1982′)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. DO NOT TAKE THE […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 3 on debt ceiling)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 2 on raising taxes)
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 2 on raising taxes) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 1 on debt ceiling)
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
The Daily Hatch 