Dems urge vote on extending middle-income tax cuts

Greg Sargent reports progressive Democrats in the House are pushing for an up-or-down vote on extending tax cuts for all taxpayers on their first $250,000 of income.

If such a vote were held and it passed, everybody would get a tax cut -- even people earning more than $250,000. It would also take the pressure of the debate over whether to enact the Republican proposal to also cut taxes on income above the $250,000 threshold. That's a policy that should be debated on its own merits, not because middle-income tax cuts have been held hostage.

Holding a vote now on middle-income tax cuts makes all the sense in the world -- so much sense that it's hard to imagine it will happen, especially given that Democrats already rejected this approach during the 2010 campaign, when they embraced the Blue Dog strategy of punt and delay. The only hope now is that Democrats will remember what following the Blue Dog strategy got them on election day: a big fat zero.