Allowing the current rates to expire only on those making over $250,000 will increase revenues (assuming static calculation) by a grand total of $42 billion in 2013, and $38 billion in 2014.

This isn’t about the deficit. This is about a psychotic hatred of private wealth in this country, and the Left’s desperate need for a symbolic and useless kneecapping of them.

This is the samurai pissing on Blackthorne’s head in “Shogun.”

My view: It would be better for America to let the Bush tax cuts expire for everyone and then fix the middle class part retroactively. The sequestration can be either nullified or kicked way down the road. The debt ceiling, pull out the 14th Amendment this time if they even begin to start their bullshit.

More realistically, the GOP will cave and vote in a middle class tax cut, and let the Bush tax cuts expire on income over $250k. This MAY save their rich buddies about $.5T. if Obama doesn’t push for further tax increases on the rich.

Note the quiet little correction at the very bottom of the NYT article:

An article on April 1 about the debt-deal negotiations last summer misstated the effect on revenue if some tax cuts enacted under George W. Bush were allowed to persist. Those cuts, for taxpayers making $200,000 or less, would be more costly, not less, than the cuts for the most affluent taxpayers.

No shit. The revenue “costs” from the Bush rates for the middle class are six times those of the high-income group.

Not only do you guys have bad ideas, you can’t even execute them properly.

Details.

Obama’s “reasonable offer sabotaged by Republicans” is a myth. A much more nuanced history here.

Logic only works if you’re not inventing the data.

It will be a maneuver designed to save Republican “face”. After all, they forced this sequestration scheme on us, and they have more to lose than the Dems if it goes through. By waiting a few days, and then quickly passing a compromise, they can go back to their Tea Party constituencies and tell them ” we did our best, but we had to save the country”. And the tax hike will be disguised to follow the letter of the Norquist Pledge, if not the spirit. Barry will give them an out, but I’m sure they’ll pay a price for it. And I’m sure they can afford it.

They have no one to blame but themselves, when they came up with this scheme, they thought President Romney, and perhaps even a GOP Senate majority would be headed to Washington. Instead, they have lost Senate seats, Obama’s firmly in the saddle, and he was elected by a majority that he told up front what he was going to do.

The Republicans should have accepted Obama’s first offer, months ago. He’s going into the negotiation now with a (dare I say it?) mandate, a lame duck immunity, his lefty constituency just spoiling for a fight, and nothing to lose. He has raised the stakes, too, so he has a lot of wiggle room for trading, the GOP has overreached and shot its wad.

Of course, this all assumes everybody reacts logically, not emotionally, something the Tea Party is not necessarily known for.

As the Fat Man says:

“That’s an attitude, sir, that calls for the most delicate judgement on both sides. Because, as you know, in the heat of action… …men are likely to forget where their best interests lie… …and let their emotions carry them away.”