Don’t worry, folks. All is well.
Barack Obama “gets” it.
"The president gets it," says the chief executive officer and chairman of Honeywell, in a Reuters article.
“David Cote, chief executive and chairman of Honeywell,” says Reuters, “told reporters that Obama understood a combination of tax measures and reforms of social programs will be necessary to address the so-called fiscal cliff and beyond that, the deficit.”
I’m really glad that Obama met with business leaders to straighten out that pesky “tax” thing that the rest of us have been so confused about. I’m equally comforted that the major wire services were right there to let us know that we don’t have to worry. The popular kids are in charge now, and it really won’t cost us very much more than it has in the past.
The fiscal cliff, tax and entitlement “reform” are now become more “settled science” that the rest of us don’t have to worry about, thank goodness. Our betters are meeting even as we speak and figuring out the winners and losers, so that we don’t have to.
Executives urge White House, lawmakers to avoid "fiscal cliff," says Reuters.
Obama Meeting With All Sides Ahead of Fiscal Cliff, says US News and World Report.
Labor leaders pleased with White House meeting, reports MarketWatch.
Oh, yeah…labor leaders. THAT explains it.
"It’s time to protect social security benefits. It’s time to protect Medicare and Medicaid benefits. And it’s time to raise taxes for the richest 2%,” says Richard Trumka, head of the country’s largest labor organization, echoing common Obama reelection themes.
OK, it will cost us a little more- OK a lot MORE- but government spending only makes up 40 percent of GDP currently. How do we end up paying for everything else the 47 percent wants?
See all of us hayseeds have thought all long that raising taxes right now, while the world teeters on the brink of a global depression, might be a really bad idea.
But it turns out that we were wrong says a coalition of government economists, politicians, liberal media-types, union bosses and elite business executives who get to shelter their earnings from tax increases.
In fairness to union boss Trumka, he, like many of us, says the fiscal cliff crisis is made up. He thinks the fiscal cliff has been invented as a cover to cut government spending, while others of us think it’s been made up to raise taxes.
So the White House has very helpfully invited select business leaders, union leaders, government economists, and politicians to the Rose Garden to show us all how the world looks with the Rose Garden optics on.
"Our customers are working hard to adapt to the ‘new normal,' but their confidence is still very fragile," Walmart CEO Mike Duke said in a statement quoted by Reuters. "They are shopping for Christmas now and they don't need uncertainty over a tax increase."
See, we all thought that what we needed was jobs and money. But it turns out all we really need is the certainty of a tax increase, a little more confidence in it, and zoom, this economy’s new normal will be, um, normaler still.
Ford’s CEO also hailed a “bipartisan” solution to tax increases, meaning “By all partisan means, please raise taxes in the name of all that’s not subject to a consumer protection recall.”
Funny how suddenly the federal government has the power to get business leaders, who in many ways are dependent upon the favor of the government, to flock the White House in support of raising taxes.
There used to be a time when the business of government was business. Now it seems that the business of business is government.
Obama gets THAT for sure.
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