Boehner on Obama Tax Plan: "You Can't Be Serious"

Kevin Glass | December 02, 2012 3:24 PM

The Obama Administration proposal to fix the "fiscal cliff" coming at the end of the year called for $1.6 trillion in tax hikes over current policy. House Speaker John Boehner

said he was "flabbergasted" when presented with the proposal this week.

Boehner tells "Fox News Sunday" that after Geithner briefed him privately on Thursday, he looked at Geithner and said, "You can't be serious." Boehner called it "silliness" that the White House was, among other things, asking Congress to give up its power to set the nation's debt limit.

Earlier today, Geithner insisted that the Obama Administration wouldn't relent on marginal tax rate hikes - one of the most economically harmful ways of raising tax revenue. The tax rate hikes for marginal income could cost up to 300,000 jobs in the next two years, and Obama's proposed taxes on savings and investments might be even more economically damaging in the long-term.

Geithner has appeared to be completely intransigent on negotiations, determined to either induce economically-damaging tax hikes or allow the nation to be driven off the cliff.