I Believe I Can Fly- Off the Fiscal Cliff

Republicans can win the fiscal cliff debate. President Obama has turned public discourse into a parade of emotional arguments. Instead of negotiating with congressional leaders he is going on tour and starting twitter campaigns, building a cultish support for his plan to raise taxes. He has framed it publicly as Republicans holding the middle class hostage to protect the rich from having to pay their fair share.. which is ironic because he's the one holding the gun. The ultimatum he has given republicans is "increase taxes on the rich.. Or everyone's taxes will go up and the world will burn." He even pulled out the pen to prove it.

He is the master of the national hostage crisis. Backing opponents into the corner and forcing them to do the bad thing and then share in the responsibility for it. It's easy to make emotional arguments when logic and data are completely inconsequential. As Reagan loved to say, "facts are stubborn things." When you have an electorate that just voted against facts, logic, reason and statistics it becomes a lot easier to back those with actual integrity into these political corners.

Republicans would be foolish to cave on taxes because we already know the outcome. We know that not only will tax hikes kill jobs and slow the economy, but we know spending will continue to rise and the deficit will continue to grow. Because the presidents plan to tax the rich has absolutely nothing to do with the deficit; there aren't enough rich people in America to pay it down through tax revenue. So what would be the point of caving on something we know to be catastrophic? If the first mate on the titanic had gotten word about the ice berg with enough time to dodge it should he attempt to change course or should he shut up and go along with the captains orders all the way to the bottom of the Atlantic? With math on our side we must hold our ground and make the greatest and most public case possible for it.

We have to pass a one year extension of the bush tax cuts and a short term resolution on the fiscal cliff so that a new congress can take the time to outline both a plan for tax reform and a plan to address bleeding, bloated entitlements. Neither of those can happen in the weeks before January first, thus the temporary resolution is necessary. We must explain why Pro growth tax reform will generate much greater revenue than Obamas asinine plan to tax the top 2 %. The president has done half the work for us, acting as a cheerleader for 98% of the bush tax cuts. We have to make the case for the one year extension of the top tier. Raising the taxes n the top 2% is NEARLY revenue neutral, so any educated person pushing for these tax hikes is doing it for "fairness" or "redistribution." We should be able to convince people that the downside of raising those taxes (killing jobs, slowing growth when growth is already nearly in negatives) is greater than the upside which is nothing more than that happy feeling that comes with revenge. The next case to make is the need to make cuts. This should be the easiest case to make, considering that its the only path to actual deficit reduction and staving off the oncoming fiscal avalanche- a fate much worse than the fiscal cliff. The American people need to understand that there will be a day of reckoning and the more we spend and the more debt we build the more painful that day of reckoning will be. There's not a reset button or a do over for national debt.

House republicans should stop attempting with the President. Or attempting to negotiate. Draft legislation for an extension of the tax cuts, even if its temporary, along with the temporary stop on the fiscal cliff. Undoubtedly senate democrats will block it because they are the real obstruction party, but at least the republicans put plans and options on the table. We will go off the fiscal cliff because of the senate democrats and in January democrats will force a middle class extension of the bush tax cuts. Taxes on the top 2% will go up on January 1st and republicans will be forced to either block those tax cuts to force the democrats to put the tax cuts for the top 2% back on th table OR just pass the tax cuts on the middle class and do nothing on the top tax cuts. If we take option 2 we bear no responsibility for obstruction or for the economic collapse that comes. Jobs, markets, interest rates on our debt will all skyrocket and the democrats will completely own it. That's when the we have to hope that President victory lap will humbly acknowledge that America is a two party democracy. And that's the moment Harry Reid, the greatest problem in Washington finally becomes marginalized. The 2014 elections will reflect a shift in who the people trust to fix the economy.

Reagan talked about a "crusade of ideas" across America, explaining why conservatism was better than more government. Economic freedom and opportunity should never be substituted for unsustainable government programs. We have to believe in Americans ability to see and embrace Americans founding principles if we can deliver it in a way that wild make the gipper proud.