This is going to be a very short and simple diary, with one plea: stop buying into the latest pro-Republican terminology meme. We should not be debating the "Bush Tax Cuts." Let's call them what they are: the Republican Tax Hike.
We all understand the essentials of the tax rate debate going on in Congress right now. Back in 2001, the Republican-majority Congress enacted, and President George W. Bush signed, legislation that included cuts in the Federal income tax rates. In order to avoid the "Byrd Rule" which allowed for senators to block legislation substantially increasing the deficit (as these cuts did) beyond a ten-year term, the Republicans built a sunset provision into the new law, making the rates automatically revert before the 10-year period had expired. They clearly assumed that someone down the road would be able to re-enact the new rates when necessary.
Point One: The Republicans required the rates to rise.
Today, with a filibuster-vulnerable Democratic majority in the Senate, it is once again Republicans who have led the way toward the pending return to higher tax rates for all Americans, by refusing to extend the rates unless the wealthiest 1% also get the benefit (which, as the president has stated repeatedly, they don't need and haven't asked for).
Point Two: The Republicans are forcing the rates to go up now.
Very simple. They inserted the rate increase then, they're insisting on it now. They shouldn't get to hide behind Bush, even as they just finished running on the platform that Bush should no longer be blamed for the current economic disaster.
They broke it. They're buying it.
The Republican Tax Hike. Say the phrase, use the phrase, make them choke on the phrase. {ProfJonathan}