"It’s official. With reports that Congress was close to a deal this morning which would avert the fiscal cliff and the president holding a press conference to bolster support for a last minute fix, reports that that the Senate will not be holding a vote on Monday night on this deal. The House has opted to adjourn for the day. At midnight tonight, the United States will go over the fiscal cliff, ushering in all the across-the-board tax hikes and automatic spending cuts that entails.
CNN Congressional reporter Dana Bash confirmed that there would be no vote tonight on Twitter early this afternoon." [Source]
Those mother f*****s!!!
Folks, while some of you are popping your Cristal and singing Auld Lang Syne, I will be crying over stocks in my portfolio dropping in earnings and my already high taxes going up even more.
Anyway, while both sides are to blame for this fiasco, I would like to give a special f**k you to wingnuts on the hill. I came to this conclusion after reading Joshua Green's article in Bloomberg Businessweek.
"On Sunday evening, after a long, fruitless day of haggling, talks between Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell to avert the fiscal cliff broke down and the Senate adjourned until Monday. Republicans had spent much of Sunday pushing to get Social Security cuts included in the deal, and when that effort fell apart, momentum toward a resolution disappeared.
If Republicans don’t have a change of heart fast, we’ll go over the cliff, and they’ll waste a huge opportunity—even without the Social Security cuts, Democrats are offering them an incredibly good deal.
With the caveat that no reporter is privy to the details of the offers being swapped, here is the deal that seemed to be emerging: Democrats would get an extension of unemployment benefits for 2.1 million people; they’d patch the alternative minimum tax for a year to protect the middle class from sharp tax hikes; and they’d implement a “doc fix” to ensure that Medicare reimbursement rates to doctors don’t fall precipitously and limit patients’ access to medical care. Republicans would get to preserve Bush-era income tax rates for households making up to $400,000 (rather than the $250,000 limit Democrats prefer). They’d also get a lower tax rate and a much higher threshold for inheritance taxes (set to revert to 55 percent on estates of more than $1 million on Tuesday). And significantly, Republicans would hold onto their greatest point of leverage in upcoming negotiations over entitlement cuts, because the deal wouldn’t raise the debt limit.
Here’s what’s important about everything Democrats would get: It’s temporary; everything expires (presumably) within a year. Here’s what’s important about what Republicans would get: it’s permanent. The tax rates won’t expire.
That means Democrats are offering a huge gift to Republicans and getting almost nothing in return because on Jan. 1, if no deal is struck, Democrats will get even more revenue than they’re asking for without conceding a thing. And if, as polls suggest, voters would blame Republicans for going over the cliff, Democrats are also offering to save Republicans from their worst impulses—which, at least for the time being, since they haven’t yet agreed, is to reject this deal.
I’m amazed liberals aren’t furious." [Source]
Actually, some liberals are furious. But since when did that matter? They are not in the driver's seat. Sadly for America, the guys (and gals) in the driver's seat are going way too fast to stop in time to avoid the cliff up ahead.
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