Give Obama What He Wants

Boehner and Obama.

Each day I become more and more frustrated with the negotiations over the Fiscal Cliff.  In the beginning, it actually looked like our President would attempt to negotiate with the Republicans and come up with some sort of bipartisan deal.  However, that has turned out to be very wishful thinking on my part.  Now, it’s like the newly empowered Democrats are taking the same road they took with the passage of Obamacare:  Take it the way we want it or we will ram it down your throat anyway.  After all, President Obama did tell Eric Cantor after the 2008 election – “Elections have consequences.”

According to a report on Thursday, November 29, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner decided the time has come to stop negotiations on the Debt Ceiling permanently.  He wants to give the President far reaching authority to raise it at will.  This sounds to me almost as onerous as the new President in Egypt giving himself dictatorial authority after the famed Arab Spring overthrew the last dictator in Egypt for the birth of Democracy.  The Democracy proved to be short lived.  If Geither gets his way, then Obama or any other occupant of the Oval Office will be able to raise it and spend, raise it and spend and then raise it some more.  Eventually, we will have no more credit rating at all under this scenario.  Standard and Poor’s will have to create new lower ratings to describe our debt situation.

Geithner further told John Boehner we must have tax increases across the board to resolve the Fiscal Cliff crisis; including capital gains, dividends, interest and marginal tax rates.  In her usual intelligent response to this, House Minority Leader Pelosi is reported to have stated, we have cut enough already.  May I ask, what?  Boehner’s response was to call a Press Conference in which he said that no substantial progress had been made in the negotiations over the Fiscal Cliff.

So, what happened to the goodwill over the supposed compromises on the Fiscal Cliff?  I will tell you very simply, there never was any.  The President knows he doesn’t have to get reelected again.  (Witness his off the mike comments to Russian President Medvedev a few years ago).   He knows this is his last stand.  So, why should he care.  Same for Nancy Pelosi.  She is old and just about ready to retire as well.  Especially, if she doesn’t get the Speakership back in 2014.  And, Harry Reid is another relic on his way to retirement.  So, why do any of them care?  This is their last stand to get what they want and they are going for it.

Heading Over and nothing may stop it.

So, what should Boehner and other GOP leaders do in response?  In my opinion, it is very simple:  Give the President what he wants.  Give it almost all to him and make sure he owns it when it fails.  He will not be able to blame George W. Bush on this anymore.

I know many of you are going to object to this proposition.  But, my reasons are very clear.  Obama is going to use this negotiation on the Fiscal Cliff to embarrass and shame the GOP as much as possible so that he can hopefully get the House back in 2014 in order to really mess the country up.  If we give him what he wants now and it doesn’t work as we believe, then short of putting more idiotic candidates into Senate elections such as Akin and Murdoch, we may actually get the Senate back and have real leverage in Obama’s last two years.  We can stop his destruction of America.

Of course, when I say, give him what he wants, I don’t mean give everything.  There should be some limit.  Let him raise taxes on the wealthy.  Everyone knows this is simple class warfare at this point.  In fact, I’ve heard nothing but the words “fair share” on CNN and the BBC since my arrival in Thailand.  It’s all about being fair, so give him this one.

As for the other Fiscal Cliff issues, I would let them retain the Social Security tax break.  Everyone loves that even though it’s bankrupting Social Security, but again, it’s another thing to hang them on in the future.  And, in the meantime, let’s make sure we can get some spending cuts.

Lastly, there is no way I would give Mr. Geithner’s proposal any credence.  The debt ceiling stays in control of Congress.  If we gave it to Obama or any other President for that matter, it would mean that the Fiscal Cliff would become a regular falling.

Tags: Fiscal Cliff, GOP, John Boehner

This entry was posted on December 3, 2012 at 6:30 am and is filed under Economy, Frank DeMartini, GOP. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.