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I have to admit to an imperfect understanding of this issue.
First, the original tax cut was a Democrat idea, was it not? Cut payroll taxes, which are supposed to have been Social Security taxes, but have been spent on anything and everything for decades, in order to put a few more bucks in the pockets of the middle class and working poor. OK, so far.
Of course, the issue of keeping SS alive while cutting the tax hasn't been addressed.
Then, the Republicans want to extend the tax cuts for a year, while the Democrats want to extend their own idea for two months.
and, finally, they cave and the Democrats get their way, which is to continue the tax cuts they initiated only two months instead of a year.
I must be missing something here.
Maybe I can help. This beast that is the payroll-tax cuts was created solely to be used as a wedge issue. The Democrats had a plan on the table to extend it for a year ..... by adding a surtax to those making over $1 million of 3.5% on top of their already high rate. And while the tax cut extension was only for one year, the surcharge was eternal. But it fits Obama's class warfare reelection nonsense.
I don't think the Dems so much as wanted the increase, as they did hope that the GOP would not go along, and they then had the common folks suffering, because the GOP were "protecting the rich". The GOP hit back by getting the pipeline, and its jobs, in the mix, such that Dems would have to vote for the pipeline now, which they do not want to do. So the 2-month thing was just kicking the can while the Dems refigure the politics on this.
What Obama wants most on this extension, and you can bank it, is for it to stalemate a bit, but with the blame being on the GOP for protecting their rich buddies. He wants that more than he does a solution that has no fanfare.
February is going to be a massive maneuver of the blame-game. Because that is Obama. The inept President. The worst President ever.