Editorial: For Democrats, It's All About Tax Hikes Posted 05/20/2011 06:46 PM ET
Politics: If nothing else, last week made it abundantly clear where Democrats stand on today's most pressing issues, and the picture isn't pretty.
In case you missed it, the Democrats floated a plan for a millionaire surtax in an attempt to, as the Hill put it, "force Republicans to accept other tax increases." They tried to hike taxes on oil companies by more than $2 billion a year, because the industry is currently making big profits; and mounted a nationwide campaign to scare seniors away from Rep. Paul Ryan's Medicare reform — including a new ad that depicts Ryan tossing a senior citizen off a cliff.
Detect a theme there? On issue after issue, Republicans are putting forward serious, sober and often politically risky solutions to the nation's most pressing problems, while Democrats play class-warfare games and stoke the public's fear.
To cope with the nation's gargantuan debt, for example, the GOP issued a budget plan that focuses — correctly — on reining in the government's runaway spending.
The only thing Democrats want to talk about is how all our problems can be solved if we just raise taxes on the "the rich."
President Obama wants to boost them by at least $1 trillion, and Senate Democrats promise their long-delayed budget will include $2 trillion in new taxes.
That's ill-advised even if the economy were humming along, but reckless given the current state of things.
When it comes to sky-high gas prices, Republicans at least understand that the root of the problem is too little oil supply, and in the Senate this week they tried to pass a bill to boost domestic oil production, only to be blocked by Democrats.
Listen to the Podcast Subscribe through iTunesWhat do Democrats do instead? Demonize oil companies for making a profit and try to squeeze them for extra tax dollars. As President Obama said, "They are making tens of billions of dollars each — huge profits — while you're struggling to fill up your gas tank."
Never mind that less oil production and more oil industry taxes are the exact opposite of what's needed to bring gasoline prices down.
And while House Republicans advocate a serious Medicare reform plan that harnesses market forces to rein in the program's costs and protect it for the future, Democrats offer only fear.
Health and Human Services head Kathleen Sebelius said Ryan's Medicare plan would cause some seniors to "die sooner," and the Democratic National Committee proclaimed in an ad that Republicans are "now for killing" Medicare.
The topper came in the Ryan-pushing-grandma-over-the-cliff ad, produced by a group headed by the DNC's former deputy national finance director.
What's their Medicare solution? Nothing.
Democrats might think stoking envy and fear is politically sufficient, but we give the public more credit than that.
The country faces serious problems and voters deserve political leaders willing to step up and propose serious, credible solutions.
As the last week made clear, they aren't getting anything like that from the party of FDR
