Say Anything Blog

Remember when Obama said that Americans making less than $250,000/year wouldn’t pay a single dime more in federal taxes?  Well not only does Obama plan on making your lives more expensive with a cap and trade tax, but it his administration isn’t ruling out tax hikes for people making less than $250,000/year to pay for health care.

I pressed Axelrod on whether Obama will draw a line in the sand and veto any bill that funds health care reform with tax hikes for people making under $250,000 a year — a pledge Barack Obama made during the 2008 presidential campaign.

“One of the problems we’ve had in this town is that people draw lines in the sand and they stop talking to each other. And you don’t get anything done. That’s not the way the president approaches us. He is very cognizant of protecting people — middle class people, hard-working people who are trying to get along in a very difficult economy. And he will continue to represent them in these talks,” Axelrod said.

“But they’re also dealing with punishing health care costs, and that’s something that we have to deal with.”

So instead of having people deal with “punishing health care costs” we’re going to force them to deal with punishing new taxes?

Let’s not forget that Obama got elected by paying lip service to fiscal conservatism.  He said “tax cuts for 95% of Americans.”  He said nobody under $250,000/year will pay more in federal taxes.  Now we find out that the amount of money Obama wants the government to take out of our collective pockets is going to be a lot more than he let on while campaigning.

I actually think this might be the death knell of his plans for government health care.  The one thing liberals cannot let the public in general get wind of is just how much government health care will cost them.  If the Democrats are forced to try and pass a plan for a new government health care program alongside the sort of tax hikes it’s going to take to fund it they simply are not going to get it passed.

The only chance the Democrats have is convincing the American electorate that nationalized health care will be some new entitlement they get without ever really having to pay for it.  The minute Americans think they will be paying for it, it won’t pass.