Taxes

Somewhere, George Bush is laughing . . . That was the image in Joe Scarborough's mind this morning.  The Morning Joe host repeatedly made the point that whereas Dems continue to control the White House and massive congressional majorities, they now are looking at the Bush tax cuts, which for years they vilified, as their last best hope. When it comes to Republican and Dem support for…

The award for Best Line of the Weekend goes to Wall Street Journal editorial page editor Paul Gigot who on Sunday's "Meet the Press" offered a delicious irony concerning Friday's surprise press conference hosted by Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. "I love the symbolism of two Democratic presidents--not one, but two--endorsing Bush tax cuts, saying, 'We need them crucially to help the economy' (…

A New York Times "Learning Network" graphic informs us that under the proposed Obama-GOP tax and spending compromise, "rates will not change for at least two years for anyone." Wow. Somebody at the Learning Network needs to tell the Old Gray Lady's beat reporters, editorial board, and opinion columnists. Just today, reporter Helene Cooper, in noting how Vice President Joe Biden is playing a "…

How can you cover a story about Uncle Sam's November Monthly Treasury Statement and the proposed Obama-GOP compromise on taxes and unemployment benefits without using the words "spending," "receipts," any form of "collect," or "unemployment"? It's a neat trick, but the Associated Press's Martin Crutsinger pulled it off in his Friday afternoon dispatch shortly after the government report's…

The staggering ignorance and/or blatant dishonesty of liberal economic commentators never ceases to amaze me. Consider the following item from former Clinton labor secretary Robert Reich published at the Huffington Post moments ago (picture courtesy Life magazine):

Charles Krauthammer on Friday scolded Mark Shields and other liberals for "moaning and bitching" about the President's compromise tax plan after months of demanding the White House implement a second stimulus package. After Shields on PBS's "Inside Washington" predictably criticized Obama for agreeing to extend the Bush tax cuts on the so-called rich, Krauthammer marvelously struck back (…

Not that he legitimately deserves our pity, but imagine the difficulty of being Ben Feller at the Associated Press yesterday. You've just attended a suddenly announced joint press conference with President Barack Obama and former president Bill Clinton to announce the latter's support for the former's tax- and spending-related legislative proposals worked out with Republicans. You witness the…

A profile in courage he's not. Ed Schultz, the MSNBC pundit most likely to seek a career in professional wrestling, showed what he's made of during a call to his radio show Wednesday (audio here) --

Jami "Sarah Palin is an extraordinary ass" Floyd made her best pitch for an Obama White House gig this morning, charting a course for the president's rehabilitation before the 2012 election and chastising the Republicans's "Bah! Humbug!" tax compromise. Chris Jansing, anchor of MSNBC's "Jansing & Co.," asked Floyd to assess the argument some Democrats are making that the president should…

President Obama is a nice, moral family man. Too bad he has to deal with wild-eyed ideologues in the congressional GOP. That's the sentiment of Eleanor Clift's December 10 Newsweek.com piece, "Filling In the Blanks," which examines where the president stands in the public's perception at the midway through his term in office. As is standard operating procedure for Clift, Republicans and…

Recent news media coverage of the tax debate in Congress borrows heavily from misleading liberal Democratic talking points, NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell told viewers of today's edition of "Fox & Friends." "Eighty percent of the time, the media have it wrong," the Media Research Center founder noted, referring to an MRC study on coverage of the debate on whether or not to extend the…

Kathleen Parker, CNN's resident pseudo-conservative, gushed over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday's Parker-Spitzer, trumpeting how the San Francisco liberal stood amongst her fellow Democrats: "She's the 'mama grizzly' in this crowd, is she not?" Parker also stated she had "great admiration" for Pelosi, and even cheered her on: "Go, Nancy!" [audio available here] The host, along with…

Thursday's network newscasts and Friday's morning shows all ignored the report that an unidentified Democratic House member muttered, "F**k the President" during a closed door meeting on a compromise over taxes. Yet, many journalists professed outrage when Congressman Joe Wilson yelled "You lie" at President Obama in 2009. ABC's The Note website on Thursday afternoon explained, "An…

In an interview with Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine on Friday's CBS Early Show, co-host Harry Smith seemed to lament the deal to extend current tax rates and wondered: "...this gets extended...assume the economy's much better two years from now, assume you still have a Republican-dominated Congress, there's any chance that these taxes ever going to go back into effect?"  …