PELOSI: ... It is definitely an advantage for us because we have aligned ourselves with those who passed Social Security, Medicare and now health care for all Americans as a right not a privilege. Image Credit: Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images via Examiner
Congressional Adjournment - The Food Stamp Party Versus The Paycheck Party
Democrat leadership over these last four years has given us nearly 10% unemployment, an increase in our debt through spending by nearly 25%, and an increase in people on welfare assistance by nearly 50%. Now, Democrats want to send Congress into recess without taking any action to cancel the tax hikes that will come at the end of the year, putting off the debate until after the midterm elections. They want to play the percentages that they can put the blame on Republicans for supposedly blocking the debate in an attempt to force Democrats to agree to an extension of all current tax rates, rather than letting "just" the highest income brackets get hit with a tax increase.
The big problem with this strategy is that centrists in Pelosi’s House of Representatives caucus can read the writing on the wall in their districts. They don’t want to go back home and explain any kind of tax hike, not even a class-warfare explanation about soaking the rich, in a recessionary environment. Their Republican opponents would use such a vote to paint them as tax-and-spend Democrats ... which they are, given their record over these last four years, and many of them would have to look for a new job.
This has led to a bipartisan consensus that would pass, TODAY, an extension of the current taxation plan put in place at the beginning of the previous administration - hence NO Tax Increase!
On Nov. 2, three of the temporary Senate appointments will expire. That means Illinois's Roland Burris, Delaware's Ted Kaufman and West Virginia's Carte Goodwin will all be out of a job. If voters do not allow this tactic of sending Congress into recess without taking any action to cancel the tax hikes that will come at the end of the year to stand by going to the polls in five weeks, and voting every Democrat party incumbent out - their replacements would be Republicans. Democrats could return to the lame-duck session with three fewer members of their party, making it less likely they can hold out against the efforts of Republicans and centrists Democrats who want to extend the "Bush Tax Cuts." They've also potentially made voters question the Democrat Party's determination to fix the economy in general.
As Newt Gingrich put it this morning - "This election is a fight between The Food Stamp Party versus The Paycheck Party [Democrats vs. Republicans]!"
This is not a time for Democrats to show a lack of guts and leadership for it will cost them for decades to come. When they lose power, who would ever take the progressive agenda seriously again?
UPDATE - September 29, 2010:
Pelosi's Congress votes to adjourn just as 47 Democrats commit to pass an extension to our current tax laws.
By voting to go on recess, the Democrats show that they wish to raise taxes on all citizens while continuing to spend money we do not have at record levels. This group of leaders have increased the debt in two years what it took forty Presidents to spend and add to our country's debt in over two-hundred years.
