To the old adage that the only things certain in life are death and taxes can now be added a third certainty: That the Republican Party always manages to outdo itself when it comes to crazy, out-of-the mainstream ideas.
How else to explain that influential members of the anti-tax party are now proposing to:
* Tax the poor because, you know, they’re a bunch of loafers and need to pay their fair share, too.
* Increase payroll taxes for middle-class families earning $50,000 or more. No family making more than $106,000 would pay higher taxes
Tax cuts for the wealthy, of course, remain on the table.
The new taxes and tax increases would kick in on January 1 and replace the 4.2 percent payroll tax decrease that President Obama wants to extend for another year in an effort to keep the economy from contracting further.
The latest GOP salvo is another exercise on moving deck chairs on their Titantic, since both proposals will not play well on Main Street and among the independent voters the party must attract in droves if it has any chance of retaking the White House and Senate.
The proposals also are a slap in the kisser for Grover Norquist, whose demands that no taxes be raised evah are sadly representative of a party for whom ideological purity and ultimatums have replaced governance.
Asked by a reporter to comment on the proposals, the head of Americans For Tax Reform made a face and turned tail.
The proposals also presumably would be anathema for Rick Perry, the current darling of the right-wing presidential wannabe field.
The Texas governor wrote in Fed Up! that making income tax constitutional through the Sixteenth Amendment has lead America on a “road to serfdom“ and the amendment should be repealed and replaced with a national sales tax or what he terms a “fair tax,” which would abolish all federal personal and corporate income taxes, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, and self-employment taxes and replaces them with one simple, visible, federal retail sales tax administered primarily by the states.
Oh, and Social Security and Medicare would be abolished.