Did you know that Obama had a plan to increase taxes automatically? I didn’t know about Obama’s plan. Apparently the MSM doesn’t know or doesn’t care. Worst of all, it would seem that our Republican’s in Washington are also unaware of Obama’s plan and that makes me FURIOUS!
Yesterday I received an E-mail from my friend Pat Slattery of The Free Market Project. Here is how Pat’s message began:
We’ve got the bastard now! James Howe pointed Obama’s “debt failsafe trigger” out to me a few days ago. Now Dan Mitchell and Powerline have posted on it.
It’s the lynchpin, Jim. I’m telling you, it’s the thing that is so obtuse about the man that it can get him defeated in 2012. He truly believes that YOUR money belongs to the government. His “debt failsafe trigger” is automatic TAX INCREASES if the government spends too much. Not automatic spending cuts. He’s completely revealed himself. YOUR money belongs to him and the progressives.
So what is this “debt failsafe trigger” that John is talking about? Here are some excerpts from the article that Dan Mitchell published in his International Liberty blog on April 13, 2011:
Responding to widespread criticism of his AWOL status on the budget fight, President Obama today unveiled a fiscal plan. It already is being criticized for its class warfare approach to tax policy, but the most disturbing feature may be a provision that punishes the American people with higher taxes if politicians overspend
Called a “debt failsafe trigger,” Obama’s scheme would automatically raise taxes if politicians spend too much. According to the talking points distributed by the White House, the automatic tax increase would take effect “if, by 2014, the projected ratio of debt-to-GDP is not stabilized and declining toward the end of the decade.”
Let’s ponder what this means. If politicians in Washington spend too much and cause more red ink, which happens on a routine basis, Obama wants a provision that automatically would raise taxes on the American people.
You’re reading that correctly. Obama’s plan is that whenever government spending increases the ratio of debt to GDP, taxes will be automatically increased. How’s that for audacity? So I am understandably furious; but not just at Obama.
Obama’s plan was unveiled on April 13. Dan Mitchell wrote his piece the same day. Powerline picked-up the story on April 15 and John ran the story yesterday, April 17 and, I am running the story today , April 18. That is all to the good. This story needs to go viral. But I am pissed because I’m just hearing about this through the blogosphere. WHERE THE HELL IS OUR REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP? This story should be on the lips of every Republican politician in America. I want to know why it isn’t! Obama should be absolutely laughed out of Washington for proposing such a plan.
Pat Slattery thinks the Republicans could run an entire political campaign around this plan of Obama. I agree. Obama is trying to reinvent slavery or indentured servitude. It seems to me that Obama has handed the Republicans, on a silver platter, the perfect weapon to use against him in the coming elections. But, what do I know. I’m just a lonely blogger down here in Venezuela, trying to make sense out of what is happening to my homeland. What do you think?
Asylum Watch 
Gee, I took off a couple of days to refresh, and come back to what is starting to be Obama’s “Big Push”… GOP get moving. The Dems are controlling the narrative. Obama will be out on the trail now until election day with his lies. The only one standing up is Trump, and he is a merely a distraction.
And what do we get from our Republican leadership? A big yawn! If America is to have a chance, the conservatives must completely take oevr the Republican Party.
Republican leadership? Hah! They’re all rhinos.
When will the Democrats learn that our money is not the governments?
The Democrats I understand. When are the people going to lear that it’s their money and not the governments.
It never ceases to amaze me how liberals in great numbers are always in a rush to turn over large chunks of their hard-earned cash to someone else. If that doesn’t prove the innate derangement of the chattering Democratic voter, nothing does.
I can’t explain it , Bob. But one would atleast expect the Republican leadership to be up in arms. We desperately need some new leaders.
Er… It’s “Pat” not “John”… You must be thinking of my uncle–who would also be furious about this.
In my mind I picture a king… I don’t care if the king looks like Obama, or it is some stand-in for big government progressivism (same thing, I know). An adviser comes to the king and says, “Sire, we are running out of money to keep the castle running properly, not to mention the estates throughout the countryside.”
The king turns to the adviser and says, “Let the people know that if this situation isn’t resolved, they must pay more. After all, we can’t have a country without a properly opulent castle. It is hereby decreed: If the opulence of the castle appears to be diminishing in any way, my subjects shall be allowed to keep even less of that which I so generously allow.”
Color me embarrassed. that’s the second time I’ve done that to you. Must be the on set of Alzheimer’s.
Well I don’t recall any coronation ceremony that placed a crown on the head of Mr. Obama. This would be king needs to be taken to the wood shed and given a good spanking.
How do you fight the mindset that money belongs to the whole and that only a select group have the right to make decisions on how that money is spent and every other aspect of the common man’s life?
If we don’t cut this cancer out soon, it will be too late.
As Bob Mack says, how can so many people go along with these plans to confiscate their earnings? I can’t wrap my mind around it.
This is the kind of tax liberals really love, like the VAT. No one sees it. No one knows it happened. It’s just a little nibble here, and a nibble there, and the next thing you know the total ends up huge.
Can you imagine the corrosive effect on what little spending restrain there would be if politicians knew they could pass tax increases without passing tax increases. My lord, that’s a nightmare scenario.
yes sir! Welcome to the high speed train to the great abyss. A nightmare for us but a dream come true for them.
I think we need to devise a plan for automatic tax decreases. Ideas?
But Michael, didn’t you hear what our dear President said. Tax cuts cost the government too much! Now who are you going to believe; your own intellect or the great community organizer. Oh! I see your point. This guy needs an enema that reaches the brain.
I think I’ll list to Chico Marx: “Who you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?”
That’s good! Thanks, Michael.
Obama, then, doesn’t believe in accountability — particularly with regard to fiscal responsibility.
If he’s able to go through with this plan, he will enslave us all via taxation! At the same time, he’ll entrench the oligarchy.
“If he’s able to go through with this plan, he will enslave us all via taxation!”
That is indeed his plan, AOW. The question is will the sheep follow him over the cliff?
Here’s my idea for a “debt failsafe trigger.” The Capitol will be rigged with poisonous stinkbombs that automatically drop from the ceiling if the debt goes over the limit. The antidote would be triggered by pushing a button that automatically debited government programs across the board to get us back under the limit.
Not bad, Silver. But maybe it would be better if they knew there was no antidote. That might make them behave.
Perhaps the Treasury Department needs the account information of every current and former member of Congress. If the “trigger” is pulled, the money will come out of their personal assets. I’m thinking that would get their attention.
Okay,CT. I like that idea. Let’s add-in every company that has a sweetheart deal with the government. We’d have a balanced buget in no time.
Wow, and this is so very thinly veiled at that. So, they just spend whatever they want, and we get the bill. Given their current spending habits, they’ll bankrupt the country, and all of us as well.
Hope and Change, Matt. Hope and Change and a lot of hot air.
And I am just learning about this right now! How is it that the blogs can find this stuff out, yet our politicians remain silent? You make a great point; Obama feels as if the money that we earn belongs to the government and he can decide how much of this money we are allowed to keep.
We need to make a serious change in the leadership of the Republican Party. GO TEA PARTY!!!
I really don’t know what to say. Nothing surprises me anymore with this fool. Thanks for the heads up Jim. I will make sure I retweet this. The costs for him should be losing his reelection bid for a second term.
You are right, John. As pat said if we play this right it could be a valuable weapon against Obama in the 2012 elections.
On another day I might have said this has no chance of getting past the Republicans. I’m not so sure now.
I hear you. With the Republican leadership we have today, you couldn’t be sure.
Okay, I am late getting to this discussion, as usual, but let me interject a word of caution here. I have been reading the plan that is on the White House website and while I can find information about the debt failsafe, there is nothing about an automatic tax increase. It does mention across the board spending cuts and on spending through the tax code, but nothing about raising taxes automatically.
Don’t get me wrong, I trust President Obama not in the least and I would not hesitate to write about this on Political Realities, but I am not so sure this isn’t a rabbit trail that doesn’t amount to anything. I just want to make sure we get this right and not waste our efforts on something that doesn’t exist.
” spending through the tax code”
Larry, that is Obama speak for increasing taxes. If you Google “Obama’s debt failsafe trigger” you will find a ton of articles.
I loved that “spending through the tax code” line. Actually, I did a post on that one too. The language Obama uses reveals his underlying belief that all money earned belongs to the government. Letting us keep more of what we earn is “spending” in his mind. Worse, he sees absolutely no relationship between private sector investment and economic strength. To him, economic strength comes from government investment in the things the elite says we need (more money for education–because that has produced such wonderful results, and green energy). Obama is the economically illiterate president.
What’s worse is that his supporters are just as bad. I heard a guy on Medved’s radio program saying that the debt is Reagan and Bush’s fault. Seriously. Obama and the Democrats drive us farther into debt in a month than Bush and the Republicans did in the entire year of 2007 (their last budget year) and these people STILL blame Bush for the size of spending now… as does the child in the White House who blames everything on everyone else.
I have been doing a little reading at work today and I think I understand what they are talking about. If I do, it means they are going to automatically remove tax deductions, which would result in taxes going up. I am not even surprised by this.
If someone can point me to where the plan does contain automatic tax increases, please do so. As I said in my earlier comment, I want to make sure we get this right.
Thank you for the inspiration. I’m blogging about this on Wednesday. Great find!
You’re welcome my friend.
Not only is this very frightening, but, like you said, it really shows what some progressives believe is the nature of “money that you earned.” In this day and age, “earned” is almost an ironic word…
objectivistpolitics.blogspot.com
Objectivist _ Thank you for visiting Conservatives on Fire and sharing your thoughts. I hope you will come back often.
Your point is on the money. We have earners and we have takers. When there are more takers than earners, the America of our Founders will be no more.