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My Comment :
A Grand Bargain Insults Democracy, the People decided against Big Gifts to the Super Rich, given with the sacrifice of the Middle Class and the Poor. Now, the defeated but arrogant Republicans are acting like victors and claiming the spoils of the Electoral Battle to satisfy their brutal masters and puppeteers ( The Corporations that represent the Super Rich ).
Huffington Post
On the Fiscal Extortion; Just Say No
November 30, 2012
By Robert Borosage
President, Institute for America's Future
On the Fiscal Extortion; Just Say No
Some excerpts :
Easily lost in the tumult is simple common sense. No deal is a far better alternative than a bad deal -- and the grand bargain now being discussed is a very bad deal. Here are the reasons citizens should be skeptical about the rush to agree.
1. It's time to call the bluff of the economic extortionists
What we face isn't a fiscal cliff; it's economic extortion. The austerity bomb set to go off in January is simply another round of the economic extortion that Tea Party Republicans first used, with destructive effect, over the debt ceiling negotiations in 2011.
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4. A Grand Bargain Insults Our Democracy
We just had an election in which voters had a clear choice. Mitt Romney ran as the candidate by, for and of the 1 percent. He argued for lowering tax rates, closing loopholes, "reforming" entitlements and trickle down economics. Barack Obama ran against the odds of a lousy economy, calling for raising taxes on the rich to help invest in areas vital to our future.
Now the CEOs behind the "Fix the Debt" coalition are pushing a deal that tracks Romney's position -- including even the outrageous notion of using the fiscal showdown to sneak in a huge new tax loophole -- passing a territorial tax system that would exempt companies from paying U.S. taxes on profits reported abroad, essentially turning the entire world into a potential tax haven. Secure in their lavish pensions, the CEOs are ardently campaigning to curtail the retirement security vital to working Americans. This is, as Paul Krugman notes, simple class warfare from above.
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Just saying no has one other benefit. Instead of a big deal that is more likely to be harmful to the vulnerable than not, no deal opens the possibility of a new focus on what we need to do to get the this economy on the right track. The president could use his State of the Union to lay out a new foundation for growth that will also get our books in order. No deal might just clear the air for a new debate.
But that will open space for a serious argument about what we need to make this economy work once more. And it will do much less damage than a grand bargain that ignores the reforms we need, propagates the myths we can no longer afford, and adds burdens to the majority of Americans who are already struggling with declining wealth and increasing insecurity.
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