Much to the surprise of...everyone, I bet, the Washington Post today ran a front page story on how the Obama tax plan will hurt small businesses. I am not making this up. Small Businesses Brace for Tax Battle: Under Obama Plan, Some Entrepreneurs' Bills Would Soar. Kudos to reporters Lori Montgomery and V. Dion Haynes for having the guts to write something questioning the Obama "Great Society" tax-and-spend extravaganza (and still within the 100-day honeymoon period of the new administration, at that). One can only imagine Obama operatives having a collective cow this morning, gripped by a rampant feeling of betrayal by the normally-friendly Washington Post. Anyhow, the article actually describes the predicament of a small business owner, Gail Johnson, who files her income taxes using the individual income tax form, like so many small business owners do. The article points out that Johnson and her husband make more than $500,00 a year but that that includes individual and business income, so it's not as wealthy as it sounds.
You hear 'tax the rich,' and you think, 'I don't make that much money,' " said Johnson, whose Rainbow Station programs are headquartered near Richmond. "But then you realize: 'Oh, if I put my business income with my wages, then, suddenly, I'm there.'
Remarkably, the article then goes on to note that President Obama "vowed repeatedly" during the campaign not to increase taxes for families making less than $250,000 a year, so now he must target 3 million families plus small businesses. The bottom line for Johnson, it seems, is that her taxes will go up by 19 percent. NINETEEN PERCENT. -pause- Show of hands for anyone whose income or investments increased by 19 percent lately?? Right.
Anyhow, I've no idea what came over the editors at the Post, who typically either don't run stories like this or else bury them in the middle part of the Saturday edition. But I've got a suggested follow up for them: Democratic Energy Cap-and-Trade Tax Scheme Is the Biggest Tax Increase In History, as my colleague Myron Ebell explained over on Fox Nation last week. Maybe I'm an optimist, after all.
