but I suspect that Chambliss simply committed the common Republican sin–he mentioned the words “raise taxes” without making it clear whether he meant rates or revenues, and/or intentional or as a side effect of a growing economy due to lower rates.

A non-scientific O’Reilly poll came up with the following: Given four areas to choose from, Defense, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, 58% of those who responded chose Medicaid as the area from which to make “big budget cuts.”

I’ll take the time to read your links tonight. In my personal situation, I get a sizable deduction for mortgage interest, so I would be hurt if it just went away. However, I wouldn’t fight to keep it if it meant a reduction of tax rates to the lower rates of either Ryan or the Commission. (If it is eliminated, instead of using an income discriminator to allow some people to keep it, they should just gradually phase it out for everybody.)

The answer to our problem of a sluggish economy is clearly to reduce top rates back to below 30%, with lower incomes’ rates reduced commensurately, and the elimination of most exemptions and deductions and ALL SUBSIDIES TO BUSINESS AND ANYBODY ELSE. The gubmint has no business subsidizing anything, especially Generals like Motors and Electric.

The stumbling block is the body of those who refuse to give up THEIR preferential treatment, and our memory. Reagan got it almost perfect 30 years ago (to steal a phrase from today’s paper’s letter page). Then Congresses and Presidents raised rates, put in new and different preferences, and we were back in the same old mess, just not quite as bad. Oh, and they also continued to spend more than they took in, even though they were taking in much more than before. And we remember that.

It still boggles my mind (so I don’t often think about it) that Reagan showed us exactly WHAT WORKS and our sainted leaders have been pretending it didn’t happen ever since.

I have some ideas of my own percolating, but sometimes it’s just hard to concentrate.

the Sixers have any faith in “increased revenues [coming] (from lower rates and deregulation)”. They will be holding back on reducing rates to where they should be– perhaps by recommending that they stay where they are, instead of being increased “as Obama wants,” while they are resolute in cutting deductions and exemptions (for non-favored groups) but probably not subsidies.

Just exactly WHY do we have to increase our tax revenue if we reduce spending, say to 2008 levels?

It was good work.

However, while this is accurate, “Whether the ?gang of six? endorses lowering rates or not, the fact is that was precisely what Chambliss said. And there have been no credible reports of him wanting to raise rates,” I bollixed things up myself. To clarify–Erick did NOT claim that Chambliss wanted to raise RATES, and neither did I. Still, Chambliss himself has said that he does want to increase REVENUES (what is usually meant when someone says “raise TAXES”):

“[Chambliss and Warner] told the newspaper that the plan would… eliminate many tax incentives ? using 80 percent to 85 percent of the revenue to lower tax rates and the rest to reduce the deficit.”

And

“Chambliss… has said that… most definitely, tax hikes will be in the final product, likely in the form of eliminated tax deductions in favor of personal and corporate tax rate reductions.”

And

“[Chambliss] starts by selling the commission plan as a tax cut for most people that would boost economic growth even though revenue would increase by a net of hundreds of billions of dollars over the coming decade because many deductions would shrink or disappear.”

None of those statements make sense unless based on an increase of revenues above the level of an unchanged tax code. Especially note “because many deductions would shrink or disappear.” Although Chambliss disagrees, that IS a tax increase if those disappearing features more than offset the savings from a reduction in RATES.

In fact, I don’t even care about the nuances of the language; whether we call them tax increases or not. That’s only important if it shows a preference on the Sixers’ part for revenue increases over spending cuts. Why are we even discussing this? The Sixers’ plan only cuts $4 trillion out of the proposed Obama budgets, apparently over 12 years. The Ryan plan cuts $6 trillion in ten years. Even THAT isn’t good enough if we can get a conservative Senate and White House, but it’s better than $4 trillion. Chambliss, Coburn, and Crapo–Get on board! This train is going to leave anyway, so join Ryan and the House and help shovel some coal.

**Possibly not. But this is the fifth diary in less than a month to make the claim that Chambliss is planning on ?raising taxes?.**

That’s because he DOES plan on raising taxes. If devices to create tax revenue increases (elimination of deductions, etc.) are not fully matched by devices to reduce tax revenues (rate reductions), the result is a tax increase.

**I guess I?m just still not seeing why lower rates, higher revenues, and lower deficits is a bad thing.**

In a nutshell–there is nothing wrong with lower rates. In fact, lower rates (if there is some assurance that they are not just temporary) from today’s levels will also lead to higher revenues as a consequence of growth compared to unchanged rates.

Higher revenues, if ALL applied to paying off national debt and structured to be reduced as a function of the shrinking debt, would be OK. Just “higher revenues,” however, ARE BAD, not good, because they encourage higher levels of spending, and they encourage the establishment of new programs, including entitlements.

Lower deficits are great, and the quickest and surest way to achieve them is to cut spending. Spending reductions don’t require the establishment of new bureaucracies to support them; they don’t require new 2700 page laws to implement them; they don’t require a new Cabinet level secretary to administer them. They just require that our representatives actually REPRESENT us and do the cutting. Trying to reduce the deficit by increasing tax revenues isn’t even practical at today’s levels of taxes, GDP, debt, and deficit. (If you MUST have increased revenues, that will eventually happen as the economy recovers, and the best way to bring about a recovering economy is to eliminate or reduce a bunch of federal spending programs, especially ObamaCare.)

**Of course, you realize that the Ryan plan does the exact thing as the Gang of RINOs-lower rates and close deductions.**

Similar idea, different degree. It’s the difference between “higher tax revenues” and “revenue neutral.” As I understand it, Ryan’s plan is revenue neutral, but I haven’t found that direct statement. What he has said is that

“it cuts $6.2 trillion in spending from the president’s budget over the next 10 years, reduces the debt as a percentage of the economy, and puts the nation on a path to actually pay off our national debt. Our proposal brings federal spending to below 20% of gross domestic product (GDP), consistent with the postwar average, and reduces deficits by $4.4 trillion.”

That implies that ALL the deficit reduction comes from spending cuts, none from revenue increases. That’s far better than the President’s fantasy, and trillions of dollars better than the Sixers’ yet-to-be-created product. And it will lead to a balanced budget, which doesn’t seem to be a goal of the Sixers at all. And I believe that the Ryan plan is the LOW end of what we might achieve if we had a conservative Senate and White House.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703806304576242612172357504.html

http://budget.house.gov/fy2012budget/