United Liberty

We’ve been given a taste of President Barack Obama’s campaign against Mitt Romney over the last few weeks. It’s going to be brutal, folks. Granted, Obama can’t run on his own accomplishments, or lack thereof, so the attacks against Romney are to be expected.

One of the most frequent lines of attacks are against Romney’s time a Bain Capital. Team Obama alleges that Romney shipped thousands of jobs overseas, rather than keep in them in the United States. Whether the attacks are true or not is irrelevant. As Matthew Yglesias explains, what Bain Capital did — which is actually “off-shoring,” not “outsourcing” — is nothing of which to be ashamed.

But what about President Obama, who, by the way, has taken plenty of money from Bain Capital employees? Obama’s own economic policies are sending taxpayer dollars overseas to foreign firms and through selling off our mounting national debt, as Brian Darling explains:

There has been a troubling trend in state governments over the few years. As legislatures seek to fill holes in their budgets, they’ve turned to the Internet as a way to raise revenue. My home state of Georgia recently passed an Internet sales tax as a part of a broader tax “reform” law (even though it’s really not tax reform).

But the Wall Street Journal notes that the move to tax Internet sales through websites like Amazon.com is gaining more steam among Republican governors eager to find a new revenue stream:

Republican governors, eager for new revenue to ease budget strains, are dropping their longtime opposition to imposing sales taxes on online purchases, a significant political shift that could soon bring an end to tax-free sales on the Internet.

Conservative governors, joining their Democratic counterparts, have been making deals with online retail giant Amazon.com to collect state sales taxes. The movement picked up an important ally when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie—widely mentioned as a potential vice-presidential candidate—recently reached an agreement under which Amazon would collect sales taxes on his state’s online purchases in exchange for locating distribution facilities there.

There’s no way to get around it, folks, President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats are playing a dangerous game. Rather than go along with plans to extend current tax rates for all income earner, they’re apparently ready and willing for the economy fall off the “fiscal cliff.”

Recall that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) warned in May that if the tax cuts expired, the economy would dip back into a recession. More recently, Citigroup noted that the economy would see a 2.9% contraction next year if only “most” the tax cuts remained in place. James Pethokoukis warned that the Citigroup study is especially concerning because the “economy will be lucky to grow 2% next year.”

Unfortunately, these concerns seem to be falling on deaf ears. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) told CNN yesterday that the middle class could see a tax hike if Republicans don’t act on President Obama’s tax proposal. However, Republicans are willing to act provided that President Obama and Senate Democrats agree to extend all current tax rates, including those on the middle class.

Sadly, it seems that they’re more content to play political games with the economy, as evidence by the point-of-view from one Democrat, Sen. Patty Murray, (D-WV), via the Wall Street Journal:

While President Barack Obama continues to travel the nation promoting his tax hikes and other anti-free enterprise policies, a new survey from the United States Chamber of Commerce shows that only 20% of small businesses plan to hire in 2013:

Small business owners’ concerns about the future—particularly on health care and taxes-—are impacting their hiring, according to the U.S. Chamber’s fifth quarterly small business survey released today.

Only one in five small businesses (20%) expect to add employees in 2013, according to the poll of 1,225 small business owners, conducted by Harris Interactive. The majority of small businesses say they are likely to keep the same number of employees over the next year – meaning there is likely to be little change in overall unemployment figures.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision on the President’s health care law, only 3% of small business owners report that the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the law will make them more likely to hire new employees. Seventy-two percent said the health care law will make it harder for them to hire.  When asked about the impact, several respondents said they will scale back their workforce to avoid triggering the employer mandate.

With polls showing some fluctuation in the Republican Senate primary in Wisconsin, prominent grassroots groups are now lining up against each other as they side with different candidates. There is an eagerness to make sure that former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson, who supported ObamaCare, doesn’t get the nomination; however, FreedomWorks and the Club for Growth have different views on the best candidate.

The Club for Growth endorsed former Wisconsin Rep. Mark Neumann in the race late last year, noting his strong commitment to economic freedom and limited government, and launched a strong campaign against Thompson’s record, including his support of ObamaCare. And last week, the Club released this ad hitting Thompson and Eric Hovde, a Madison businessman who has seen support rise in recent weeks, on their support for higher taxes:

With the push for tax hikes on higher-income earners in full swing, a new report from Citigroup shows that President Barack Obama’s plan is not going to avoid another recession. Via James Pethokoukis, the table below shows that even with extending the tax cuts for lower and middle class Americans, we can still expect a 2.9% contraction in the economy:

Unfortunately, the White House and Democrats in Congress aren’t interesting in deal-making. In fact, they’re threatening to let the country go over the “fiscal cliff” if they don’t get their way on taxes.