So it was an empty threat?
I still haven't rolled all my thoughts about Healthy Wisconsin into one neat little throw-able sludgeball. So I won't use specifics yet.
But the tactics of "we'll take away an empty threat if you give us what we want" is very reminiscent of playground antics. In other words, in the early 80's I experienced kid politics that were right along the same lines. The approach and the remaining "threat" are childish and immature. These politics are the best we can do? Are we really willing to settle for the tallest midget when it comes to how our state is run?
State Republicans, listen. If you play into this game, you will lose what respect I have left for you. If you sign this Cambodia-style confession, don't count on any support from me in the future, because I know it will be rebuked.
You'll be no more than a lost cause until a new generation of actual conservatives can take your place in office.
The investment in getting out the vote for these people is enormous. We are up against legalized cheating when it comes to elections in this state and the deck is stacked.
Don't let us down and surrender to being blackmailed into raising taxes.
But the tactics of "we'll take away an empty threat if you give us what we want" is very reminiscent of playground antics. In other words, in the early 80's I experienced kid politics that were right along the same lines. The approach and the remaining "threat" are childish and immature. These politics are the best we can do? Are we really willing to settle for the tallest midget when it comes to how our state is run?
State Republicans, listen. If you play into this game, you will lose what respect I have left for you. If you sign this Cambodia-style confession, don't count on any support from me in the future, because I know it will be rebuked.
You'll be no more than a lost cause until a new generation of actual conservatives can take your place in office.
The investment in getting out the vote for these people is enormous. We are up against legalized cheating when it comes to elections in this state and the deck is stacked.
Don't let us down and surrender to being blackmailed into raising taxes.
Libellés : politics
posted by Phelony Jones at 7:37 AM
8 Comments:
The Milwaukee birdcage-liner is already using the "how much" (in new taxes) line in describing a Pubbie reaction.
But by refusing to pay for what is spent, Mike Huebsch is simply mirroring the same childish antics that the Democrats engaged in with Healthy Wisconsin. What is humorous is how so many seem to think Healthy Wisconsin is an extremist position but "no new taxes" is not. Absolutism is, by definition, extreme.
Compromise will mean, yes, raising some taxes or fees to pay for some of the things that the Democrats want. Not all, but some. And if Huebsch can't bring himself to do that, then who's really the one who's threatening to take his ball and go home?
You seem willing to forgive Huebsch his extremism simply because his is a flavor you like.
Raising taxes and fees to find a mutual agreement isn't blackmail. It's compromise.
Raising taxes is surrender. The state already takes too much of our money.
And yes, a government-imposed fee is a tax with a different name.
Recess,
There's nothing - ANYWHERE - saying that we "have" to raise taxes.
And since when is the government NOT confiscating our money, an extremist position????
If one side says "we'd like to spend an additional X billion" and the other side says "we'd like to spend the same as we did last time," those are by definition the extremes - the parameters in which everything else gets debate.
Any compromise has to then, by definition, fall somewhere in the middle.
So many Republicans seem to think that the definition of "compromise" is "Democrats should capitulate completely to the Republican extreme." Nobody would certainly expect the Republicans to do the same for the Democrats, to simply rubber stamp the Senate budget. That's silly.
To find an agreement - which, last I checked, was their job - compromise will be required from both sides. I don't know where that "magic middle" is, whether it's closer to where the AssGOP is or the Senate Dems are. That's for them to figure out.
For Huebsch to be an absolutist - to spend more money on schools without actually paying for it, to insist on no tax increases - would prove fundamentally that he is completely insincere about wanting to work with the Democrats to find a middle ground. Working with the other side is not "give me my extreme or I'm going home."
If Huebsch wants to do that, fine by him. My only point is that if that's the case, then he just needs to own up to the fact that he has no interest in reaching an agreement with the Democrats, and then lucidly explain to the public why he's electing to abdicate a responsibility that even Chuckles and Scooter were able to fulfill.
Until he makes a decision on which way the boat is being steered, his caucus has absolutely no clue what the hell to tell their constituents, and that right now is the biggest problem GOP members have regarding the budget. They have absolutely no idea what they're selling. Are they being absolutists? Are they trying to simply tax and spend less than the Senate? Are they compromising? Are they walking away?
I have no doubt that the Senate Democrats won't walk away from the table. They're there for the haul. The AssGOP has no idea what it's doing right now. It's making up its strategy as it goes, and everyone can see it.
RS--maybe 'they're making strategy ....' and maybe not.
We ALL expect that there will be some tax and/or fee increases.
But the HW proposal was not a legitimate 'negotiating position.' It was a load of BS; even DarthDoyle couldn't take it.
So the 'extremes' here are the zero-tax-increase vs. the Doyle budget proposal.
And there's a helluvalotta spending in the Doyle proposal which can go away before we get into 'tax/fee increase' territory.
So by the logic of recess supervisr, instead of trying to make a legitamate budget proposal, the repubs should have started by proposing a 10 billion dollar reduction in spending and taxes, a completely unworkable "plan" and then agree to compromise at no increase. The idiocy of the big spenders/taxers never ceases to amaze me.
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