A few days ago I wrote that President Obama was seeking to keep the payroll tax holiday in the news so he could use it as an election issue. Since a one year extension of the payroll tax holiday makes more sense economically and is easier to implement, the only reason to push for a two month extension is to have the issue come up again next year when the country is in campaign mode. At the time I did not realize my own predictive abilities. It has been barely two days and Obama’s White House has already begun blanketing the airwaves with stories of Americans hurt by the failure to reach a deal while simultaneously laying all the blame on Republicans and the Tea Party.
My reasoning goes like this. Respected economists, business leaders and a group of payroll processors havesaid that a two month extension is too short to have any real economic value and would be unworkable and difficult to implement. Further, if a payroll tax holiday will help boost economic activity, then logically a year long holiday makes more sense than a two month holiday. Obama understands this but he figures that by pushing for a two month extension he has little to lose and much to gain. If Republicans go along, Obama gets to call himself a tax cutter now and then again in two months. If Republicans fight for the one year extension, Obama can go to the press and claim Republicans are blocking his “tax cut”. As cynical a political game as Obama is playing, it makes good sense tactically.
With this in mind, Obama ran to the cameras today to blast House Republicans for what he said was an attempt to take $40 a paycheck away from average Americans. The $40 number comes from the White House estimation that for a $50,000 a year earner, the payroll tax holiday amounts to around $40 a paycheck. Obama is also asking folks to go to a new section of the White House website and comment about what $40 a paycheck means to them. As much as I enjoy the irony of a liberal like Obama suddenly arguing in support of lower taxes, the cynicism and posturing coming out of the White House on this is palpable. President Obama will fill the airwaves with heart wrenching stories of Americans suffering because evil Republicans are raising their taxes; even as he blocks Republican efforts to give those same Americans a longer tax holiday than the one he is seeking.
Moving forward we can expect to be treated to the usual imagery of people forgoing food and medicine, children starving and families on the brink of collapse. Already the White House website contains a story about a family having to postpone their “pizza night” and another family considering canceling their cable service. Given that Obama is fighting to ensure these hard pressed families can only have pizza for 8 weeks instead of the 52 weeks Republicans are proposing, I fail to understand why they think Obama’s plan is better, if indeed pizza is their primary concern. Does Obama intend to distract voters with pizza and television? Is this the modern American version of bread and circuses? Perhaps if he added beer he would have a trifecta worthy of wooing all of those bitter clingers out there in flyover country. Speaking of pizza, Michelle Obama enjoyed a gourmet pizza party at MA’O Organic Farms in Hawaii this week on her family vacation. Perhaps the First Lady can send some of this expensive, and no doubt delicious, pizza to the starving folks on her husband’s new site?
I am a single parent and I struggle everyday to make certain the bills are paid and my kids can occasionally have a few extras. In truth an extra $40 a paycheck would be welcome. That said, I am smart enough to understand when someone is attempting to manipulate me. Obama’s cynical use of working Americans as emotional human shields is the same type of shameless politicking he campaigned against in 2008. Lest I leave you with the impression that Obama has a monopoly on cynicism, many Republicans are urging the House to give Obama his two month extension. They say this because even though they agree with House Republicans that a one year extension is better, they figure the “optics” look bad. Woe that we have reached a point where a principled stand for good policy is a “negative” because “optics” are all that matter.
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