Geithner Won’t Rule Out New Taxes for Middle Class

[newinnm]

Source: ABC News

To get the economy back on track, will President Barack Obama have to break his pledge not to raise taxes on 95 percent of Americans? In a “This Week” exclusive, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told me, "We’re going to have to do what’s necessary.”

Geithner was clear that he believes a key component of economic recovery is deficit reduction. When I gave him several opportunities to rule out a middle class tax hike, he wouldn’t do it.

“We have to bring these deficits down very dramatically,” Geithner told me. “And that’s going to require some very hard choices.”


Read more: http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2009/08/geithner-wont-rule-out-new-taxes-for-middle-class.html

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Oh Brother

[fascisthunter]

1. but would be opposed to raising taxes on the rich

[CountAllVotes]

4. Geithner to raise taxes on the middle class

and cut taxes for the rich. This is 1925 all over again. Have we reached 1928 yet? :nuke:

1925

* The top tax rate is lowered to 25 percent - the lowest top rate in the eight decades since World War I.

http://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/connections_n2/great_depression.html

:dem: :kick:

[terrell9584]

12. They won't be able to do it

Americans will demand that it be balanced on the backs of the rich and not on them

[roguevalley]

53. he can fuck himself. I'm barely treading water as it is.

[fascisthunter]

62. I hear ya... if I didn't have my family supporting me,

I'd be completely screwed

[roguevalley]

67. I hear you back, honey. Hugs.

[Deja Q]

2. Will taxing the middle class bring jobs back?

The President did cut middle class taxes... if ours go back up ,what about the top 1% who keep getting cuts regardless? Wasn't that McCain's plan, to continue giving them more tax breaks?

[Mass]

3. Steph is becoming more and more of the GOP mouthpiece.

Geithner was not great, but Steph was insisting on having him say things he was not ready to say, such as the fact they would need to raise middle class taxes.

And now, he insists that he was not willing to rule it out.

[Wilms]

21. What's the difference.

:shrug:

And as for as Georgie, he's been a (R)Mouthpiece for sometime.

[kirby]

37. The talking heads piss me off...

Geithner said no such thang. As you say, George kept baiting him, trying to force him to say that increasing taxes are inevitable due to our fiscal mess. Geithner was smart enough to dodge it. Yes George still runs with the 'tax and spend' scare tactic headline. What an ass.

[AzDar]

5. Geithner needs to GO.

:nuke:

[Xenotime]

60. Geithner is one of the smartest people in the administration.

You should re-evaluate your thinking.

[OhioChick]

6. Fucked again. Why am I not surprised? n/t

[lurky]

7. What a cheesy trap he set.

If Geithner had said "No new taxes", he would have been painted in a corner like when Pappy Bush said "Read my lips", and I guarantee that Steph would have been first in line to use it against him.

However, by being honest and not promising on his unborn children not to raise taxes on any bracket below the 95th percentile, Steph can attack him for being "pro tax".

For the record, I am not a big fan of Geithner, though I vastly prefer him to Summers.

[Mass]

11. And most DUers will fall for the trap and blast Geithner.

I do not like him either, but it makes me sick to see people fall for the MSM like that.

[DJ13]

13. Geithner deserves blasting

[Mass]

17. Steph deserves it more for being a GOP mouthpiece.

By taking his blog seriously, you play his game. He did not get any spark from the interview, even when he tried to bait Geithner by his stupid comment about Obama not able to keep his promise. Geithner told him they were not yet deciding what to do == and he is not responsible for taxes anyway == (he could have told him more fiestfuly, but he did not say anything objectable), and Steph creates this moment out of his own imagination, hoping that some tools will fall for it.

He succeeded apparently. I do not like Geithner, he could have been more forceful, but falling for Steph is pure malpractice.

[DJ13]

20. They're BOTH in it to protect the same corporate interests

Party is no longer a way to define someones political motivation.

[DJ13]

8. Lets hear it for the Goldman Sachs owned DLC!

Obama needs to fire both Geithner and Summers ASAP before they destroy his reputation.

[flyarm]

30. don't forget the rest of the Goldman Sachs folks in Obama's Goldman administration!! eom

[kestrel91316]

9. ANYTHING to avoid taxing the richest. Anything.

[depakid]

22. Not just the richest- but the very people and institutions who cause many of the problems

in the first place.

[cascadiance]

29. And even if some of the rich didn't "cause" this, they certainly PROFITED from the scams,etc.

And it IS time to pay the piper!

Reverse the Reagan tax breaks and take us back to the earlier pre-Reagan top marginal tax rates. The wealthy corporate bribesters won't like to hear this, but it is the ONLY way to restore balance of wealth in this society and to have a non-bandaid solution to restoring our economy that won't come back to haunt us again in a year or two if we just prop up more debt and those institutions profiting from it!

People need to have REAL MONEY instead of artificial debt-based "money" to fuel the economy again, or we'll have the bubble build up all over again.

The campaign bribester system needs to be shut down now! Taxing the middle class only worsens the divide. It doesn't restore the STOLEN money from the masses that the leeches at the top have been STEALING with us at the behest of their bought government for so many years.

[stray cat]

10. For good health care for all we will all have to pay a price

and probably should pay a price. If we want it why not contribute to it - that is if it really means enough to warrant personal sacrifice. Certainly taxes should be increased for the wealthy but why shouldn't the middle class also contribute something for a health care plan they seem to support.

[Lorien]

14. True, but most of our deficit is due to military spending

I say no tax hikes on those who don't profit from war until we get the heck out of the Middle East.

[Mari333]

16. yep yep yep

[Amos Moses]

23. If we don't fight them over there...

well, you know how that shit goes. We must continue the Imperial wars no matter what it costs!:patriot:

[Igel]

28. Money's fungible.

Take the loss of the projected surplus in 2001.

Increased military spending accounted for the reduction of the surplus to zero.

On the other hand, the recession accounted for the reduction in tax revenues sufficient to eradicate the surplus.

And, on the third hand, tax cuts also accounted for a reduction in revenues that easily disposed of the surplus.

The fallacy is in asking which *one* was responsible. Three things changed at about the same time, any one of which was sufficient for the surplus to be gone. It's not like the absence of the * tax cuts would have preserved the surplus, or that had there been no war there'd have been a surplus.

Same with the current deficit--the only real things you can plausibly claim increased it are things that have changed, and since they're less than the deficit as a whole they may bear a primary responsibility, but not the entire responsibility. Remove the military spending, voila, most of the deficit is gone. Remove a lot of entitlement spending, the deficit is gone. Remove a lot of the discretionary social spending, and the deficit is gone. Laying the blame at long-established expenditures is a logical trap.

[mbperrin]

56. The ways money is spent are not fungible. War spending ends with no

new infrastructure, goods, or services. Instead, it results in the destruction of all those assets, elsewhere if the war is there, here if we fought it here. Sherman doomed the South to poverty for at least a century, and incomes are still lowest there, all because of massive war expenditures.

If money is spent on better roads, schools, housing, then goods move more reliably, more quickly, the work force is better educated and more productive, better housed, healthier both mentally and physically.

Or you could just shovel money into artificial structures like derivatives and other shadow areas (they're smoke, really), and receive no goods or services in return and funding for the competition elsewhere. Destroys productivity and income here just as surely as war, but is relatively invisible, except when the destroyers and thieves get completely out of hand, as in the last decade.

Increased production, better productivity, higher wages, would all contribute to reducing the deficit. That's productive spending. The rest is a waste and builds deficits.

Short example, then I'll go. Factory builds color TVs, sells them, pays workers, they pay mortgages, buy food and so on.

Mafia highjacks TVs, sells them on street corners. Factory has no income, closes. Now the factory workers are out of work, no money, and so is the Mafia, since they produced nothing to start with, they only stole from the producers. No one left to steal from.

[Yupster]

57. The popping of the tech bubble

was the biggest reduction of expected tax revenues. Some people are still deducting their stock losses each year from the end of the tech bubble this year.

[Amos Moses]

25. I don't think the middle class is opposed to paying.

Doesn't seem like the lower economic class would be all that opposed to paying into it as well. The problem with it is they want health care in return for their money instead of a government enforced insurance scam.

[bvar22]

33. I would agree with you IF....

...we were talking about Single Payer, or even a strong Public Option where the increase in Taxes would be offset by a savings in Health Care.

But we are NOT talking about aSingle payer or even a strong Public Option.
We are talking about MANDATED purchase of Heath Insurance with a WEAK (token) Public Option (HR 3200, LESS than 10 Million by 2019) where MOST of the tax increase will be going directly to the For Profit Health Insurance Industry.

[Iowa]

45. I would agree with you IF it was part of a legitimate plan to get this country back on track...

...but it's not. As things stand now, the corps/plutocracy own the media and control the politicians. Both political parties are completely corrupt, and bribing politicians is perfectly legal. And there is simply no plan to fix these underlying problems. So any additional money poured in will simply be diverted to cover the massive government hand-outs that have already been given to the wealthy (like Wall-Street/banker bailouts), war (military/industrial complex), and other give-aways to the already rich and powerful. And as soon as the coffers began to fill again, they (meaning the plutocracy who pull the strings) would simply create some other phony "crisis" designed to take our hard-earned money, and we'd be right back where we started, except poorer.

Three things would need to occur before increasing taxes on the middle class would be anything but a scam:

1) A fundamental change to the system that would put and end to legal bribery and the rampant political corruption we have now.
2) Corporate media concentration would need to be broken up so that trust in the nation's journalistic ethics (which is now a joke) can be restored... real journalists working unhindered by their corporate over-lords. What we have now is nothing but corporate propaganda.
3) We would need a legitimate long-term plan to turn this country around, and honest government entities that are trusted by the people to get it done.

Without these things, additional money collected from the middle-class would just disappear down a rat-hole.

[FormerDittoHead]

54. WE ARE ALREADY PAYING THE PRICE.

Any meaningful, REAL health reform should LOWER THE PRICE as we already pay more than any other country IN THE WORLD.

The ones in our country who are NOT paying the price, are those whose INCOME was (is) generated in an economy that is NOT efficient and equitable and whose WEALTH is SERVED AND PROTECTED by the military.

I would simply ask them NOT TO BREAK THEIR PROMISE TO RAISE TAXES FROM THE *RICH*.

[alcibiades_mystery]

15. Sec Treas does not determine taxes

Congress does.

[Telly Savalas]

49. But if you listen to the entire interview Geithner never once rules out

the idea of a military coup which puts all power into the hands of the executive branch thereby giving the Treasury Secretary the duty of determining tax policy.

[newinnm]

64. Was he asked that?

[depakid]

18. Hey Tim- how about a small financial transactions tax- and a Tobin tax?

Want to raise hundreds of billions without hurting the fundamentals of the economy- while also discouraging speculation and market manipulation?

[Amos Moses]

27. good idea

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/apr/27/wall-street-economy-financial-transactions-tax

[depakid]

31. Dean Baker tends to get it right

Which is why policy makers ought to listen.

[dmosh42]

19. How about stopping the 18b dollar subsidy to the oil giants first!...

Wasn't that one of the promises?

[Zhade]

47. Promises? They already got your vote, peasant.

NT!

[Autumn]

24. It's a dirty job, but someones got to do it.

We certainly can't raise the taxes on the wealthy.

[mopinko]

26. you people are swallowing abc spin?

:puke:

[MessiahRp]

32. It is so past time to fire this corporate fucking tool.

I know damn well that Obama will have to apologize for Geithner's comments as now this will cause him some political damage after all the middle class is the hardest hit and acting like you are going to raise their taxes is something the RW Media will jump all over.

Geithner's alliances to the corporate elite are pretty transparent at this point. Obama should have hired someone that was going to help real Americans out nor wealthy CEOs who dodge their taxes.

Rp

[high density]

34. Geithner doesn't set tax policy

George Stephanopoulos constantly shows what a fool he is.

[Amos Moses]

35. He just handles how tax money is sent back out to the bankers.

[bertman]

36. Of course, Timid Tim wouldn't rule out a tax on the middle class. After all, he's UPPER UPPER

class. Wouldn't want to cut into his pile o' gold now, would we?

President Obama and the Democrats are certainly not THAT stupid. Right?

Right?

[newinnm]

38. This is a trial balloon

If you think that this didn't come from the President then you are fooling yourself. What will happen now is Axelrod will go out and do a poll to see how the public reacts to it. If the polls show that the public is vehemently against it then Obama will come out and deny it. If it polls ok then there will be some spin as to how the economy is worse than thought and we couldn't have forecasted it.....blah blah blah.

[PurityOfEssence]

40. and you can see the rivets on it from here

Thud. Made of solid cast iron; couldn't fly any more than the famous Norwegian Blue with 50 thousand volts put through it.

Huge mistake. This is JUST what the Republicans love to hear; they must be dancing in the gated streets even as I type this.

Yes, your point is well taken in that the President is a big fan of plausible deniability. It was simply a stupid answer from Geithner; it should have been ducked. Once it's seen that Obama MAY tax the commoners, the reactionaries will never let it rest; to them it's as if it's already done, and it will be waved like the bloody shirt of victimization.

Stupid stupid stupid.

[LiberalFighter]

39. Geithner does not have the power to make that decision.

[bkkyosemite]

41. All he has to do is ask Buffet and Gates to donate a small portion of their loot..

[Psephos]

42. I guess you don't know how much of their loot those guys have already donated

http://money.cnn.com/2006/06/25/magazines/fortune/charity1.fortune/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/15/AR2006061501300.html

They deserve praise, not snark.

[bkkyosemite]

50. I'm aware of their donations and charity.

I'm not being a snark.

[Hugabear]

61. And they can afford to pay so much more

These people have BILLIONS of dollars that are doing nothing but sitting in a bank, not helping anybody.

[Are_grits_groceries]

43. That is all we need.

I guarantee you that even trying to raise taxes on the middle class is one thing that will drop Obama's approval ratings. The Rethugs will howl about this forever, and it will never pass anyway.

Geithner needs to STFU. If this was a trial balloon, I could have told them to skip it.

[JDPriestly]

44. Congress has the most say on the budget. We have to make sure that Congress

is liberal. Let's check our congressmembers' records and see where they stand on this. I know mine will stand by the middle and lower classes. How about yours? If yours would rather tax the middle class than the wealthy, then how about replacing him or her? Let's see where our members of Congress stand on this. Call and ask as soon as you can.

[Zhade]

46. Gosh, will Obama break yet another campaign promise?

[Abq_Sarah]

68. President Obama is going to have to do whatever it takes

And that probably will include tax increases. We can't expect him to honor a pledge made a year ago when today's circumstances are different. In any event, that pledge was broken the day he signed the tobacco tax increases into law.

[steven johnson]

48. Reagan raised taxes 11 times and raised middle class taxes

and it didn't seem to hurt his legacy. He had a 9% unemployment 3 years into his presidency.

Reagan raised taxes, says Governor Brewer

A Taxing Experience

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

59. At the time, the largest tax increase in history.

Always conveniently forgotten.

[Patchuli]

51. These well-heeled bastards better realize and soon

that the middle class is not going to pull America out of trouble. Get the money back from the greedy 1%...

[western mass]

52. Gotta pay for those banker bonuses somehow!

But I don't blame Geithner, I blame the guy who appointed him...and keeps him.

[marshall]

55. He'd be a fool not to keep his options open

And the government has got to pay for itself somehow. Until money and/or gold starts shooting out congress critters rear ends the only way to raise it is through taxes.

[newinnm]

63. Didnt Obama close this option

When he made his campaign promise?

[Romulox]

58. Did Timmy rule out sending billions more of those new tax dollars to his Wall Street pals? nt

[No Elephants]

65. Geithner does not have the authority to rule out, or rule in, anything. This is a talk show trick.

[newinnm]

66. Are you kidding me

Do you really think that this just came out of the blue. This is absoluetely being considered and this was just a trial balloon to put out there to see how it polls.