Carl Hiaasen: In a Giving Mood, But Only Toward the Rich

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In a giving mood, but only toward rich

Carl Hiaasen
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US Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, speaks during an event at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC, on November 4, 2010. Republicans and Democrats were seeking a new way forward after a chastened President Barack Obama admitted he had suffered a "shellacking" in this week's US mid-term elections.

Just in time for the holidays, Congress has terminated unemployment benefits for millions of out-of-work Americans. We’re told this was done as an act of fiscal responsibility, to help prune the gargantuan national deficit.

It’s somewhat revealing, then, to follow another big battle on Capitol Hill. This one centers on the so-called Bush tax cuts, which are due to expire at the end of the month.

Democrats want to keep the lower rates for all Americans except individuals making more than $200,000 a year and couples earning more than $250,000. Republicans want to extend the lower tax rates for everybody, including the wealthy -- their most prized constituency.

The problem with the GOP tax plan is that it would add about $700 billion to the deficit over the next decade. A few years ago this would have been business as usual, because the Bush administration was printing money as fast as the Republican leadership could spend it.

Now, prodded by the renegade Tea Party, guys like Mitch McConnell and John Boehner are born-again penny-pinchers. They’ve rediscovered the deficit, and declared war.

Well, sort of.

A few hundred billion here, a few hundred billion there -- no biggie, right?

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Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/12/04/v-print/1957445/in-a-giving-mood-but-only-toward.html