WH Denies Huffpo story on Tax Cuts

[Raine1967]

From the Plum line: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/11/the_morning_plum_129.html

The White House is sharply denying the Huffington Post story I noted below claiming that David Axelrod signaled a willingness to accept a temporary extension of all the Bush tax cuts, claiming that their position remains unchanged.

Axelrod emails:

There is not one bit of news here. I simply re-stated what POTUS and Robert have been saying. Our two strong principles are that we need to extend the tax cuts for the middle class, but we can't afford a permanent extension of the tax cuts for the wealthy.

And White House comm director Dan Pfeiffer adds:

The story is overwritten. Nothing has changed from what the President said last week. We believe we need to extend the middle class tax cuts, we cannot afford to borrow 700 billion to pay for extending the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, and we are open to compromise and are looking forward to talking to the Congressional leadership next week to discuss how to move forward. Full Stop, period, end of sentence.

===================================================================

This is what I was waiting to see this morning.

[peace13]

1. Ha! Now all we need is 200 reccommends....

so we can get that POS off of the home page. Thanks for posting this.

[RBInMaine]

2. Adrianna is a former right winger oddball who blasts Obama and D's all the time. Take her rag with

a big grain of salt.

[Clio the Leo]

10. And yet folks follow her like the wingnuts follow Beck...

.... all the while calling the rest of us "Cheerleaders."

Why do we condemn blind faith of our leaders while giving the same to our press?

Odd, isn't it?

[Phx_Dem]

27. +1

[treestar]

29. +2

[ljm2002]

38. You can't even get her name right...

...so I will respectfully take your opinion on her with a grain of salt.

[FSogol]

3. Won't stop the wailing and gnashing to teeth here.

Wonder how long it will take until the Huffington Post is treated the same as breaking news from The Drudge Report.

:shrug:

[wndycty]

17. No it won't there are DUers who want to be disappointed in Obama. . .

. . .celebrate every time he lets them down.

[mkultra]

20. yup, they are literally trying to undermine support for Obama

[RBInMaine]

4. Be willing to compromise on a TEMPORARY extension, the R's will filibuster, and WE win the day !

[liberalmuse]

5. HuffPo. God.

I almost got upset, too. No sense in wasting any emotion at all over most of what HuffPo posts. I guess raw story simply linked HuffPo.

[hedgehog]

When the cat's away, the mice will play?

Since Obama has been on his foreign trip, it seems that the second stringers (ie unnamed officials) have been whispering stories into the ears of reporters, "off-the record", of course. The objective seems to be to force Obama to do what they think he should do by leaking word of actions he has no intention of taking. I put the story claiming we will be in Afghanistan an added three years in this category, also.

[Botany]

6. "The story is overwritten."

Please, don't piss on my leg and tell me it is raining.

"We can't afford a permanent extension of the tax cuts for the wealthy" aka
we will extend them for the next couple of years

[Cosmocat]

15. Bullspit, bullspit, bullspit ...

I LOVE BO, and have not broke from him on anything to this point ...

But, this is meely mouthed BS ...

They need to stand the FRUCK UP, and take this head on, in a STRONG fashion ...

NO EXTENSTION OF THE TOP RATE, WHATSOEVER ...

[FormerDittoHead]

35. You got it. Since Clinton we've just been desensitized to the weasle words...

>"We can't afford a permanent extension of the tax cuts for the wealthy" aka we will extend them for the next couple of years

Exactly - until the Republicans can take the White House back.

We now know that Obama waited a LONG, SLOW TIME to SAY he was dumping the Public Option after he actually decided to do it.

Wasn't he supposed to be this political genius?

I'm really thinking Obama's "genius" (and he's way smarter than I am but...) is in FUND RAISING. He does that better than anyone else - hands down.

But 8 dimensional chess? After this year, and now what a reasonable person can expect what will happen after this "denial", I think he may have fucking lost 2012.

The thing I won't be able to bare, however, is the Republican crowing.

[Pirate Smile]

7. It was standard Huffington Post over the top headline and post.

Anything to slam President Obama seems to be their standard policy.

[eridani]

8. One "temportary" extension after another = permanent

For all practical purposes, anyway.

[RBInMaine]

13. Agree to a temporary and let the R's say NO & look like dickheads, and WE win.

[eridani]

16. But they won't--they will rightly regard it as a victory over Democrats n/t

[deutsey]

9. Glad to see they're at least shooting back n/t

[no limit]

11. Lets wait a few more weeks when Huffpo is proven right then come back to this thread

[wndycty]

18. So I take it you WANT this article to be proven right?

:kick:

[no limit]

19. No, I'm saying this article will be proven right. Do you dispute that?

[treestar]

30. You've already decided that

No matter what happens, you are going to find a way to have it proven right.

[FormerDittoHead]

36. I guess you'll want to dig up those "Obama really doesn't support the Public Option" threads too!

...and you'll see how wrong THEY were!

The funny thing is that by pointing out how politically fruitless it is to cave in the Republicans/rich, we're trying to make the Democratic party STRONGER, and yet we're shot down for it...

[backscatter712]

12. So much for the credibility of the Arianna Huff n' Puff... nt

[JamesA1102]

14. Typical HuffPo dishonest spin

That former Republican can't be trusted.

[jillan]

21. Obama has members of the Press traveling with him. All he needs to do is issue a statement.

I'm sure he can take 5 minutes out of his busy day to make a statement to anyone of the press, which in turn will get the statement to the AP, and we will know within minutes of that very statement.

And if he can't find 5 minutes, maybe he can text a message to his Vice President to make a statement in his behalf.

Sometimes the silence is worse than the truth.

[FSogol]

22. The WH denied it this morning. It has been reported everywhere.

Your notion of responding in 5 minutes is ridiculous.

[jillan]

25. Not responding in 5 minutes - taking 5 minutes out of a 24 hr day.

[gkhouston]

32. A 24 hour day which has probably been overscheduled two weeks in advance.

Yeah, he should take 5 minutes to say something he's already said before and that his staff can and has said for him again today because that will convince you? For how long?

[ljm2002]

39. The only thing the White House "denied"...

...is that there was anything new in the story.

So sure, the screaming headline was a bit much, given that we already knew the White House was open to extending the tax cuts for the rich "temporarily".

But when you get right down to it, the White House has signaled they will be willing to compromise by agreeing to an extension of ALL the tax cuts. And they did this before any negotiations started.

In other words, our side caves up front, while the other side digs in their heels.

That is not fighting for what is right, that is political cowardice.

[treestar]

31. Whenever someone talks about that five minutes

You can bet there are enough people demanding another five minutes to run out of hours in one day.

It's the hallmark of those for whom others can never do enough.

[SidDithers]

23. K&R...nt

Sid

[voteearlyvoteoften]

24. The line in the damn sand.

No tax breaks for the well to do.

[RedSpartan]

26. I hope so. n/t

[The Uncola]

28. This is exactly...

.. how all of the capitulation has been done.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

33. Despite the fact that Obama has denied this story, as of 12:45 p.m., it is STILL

Huffington Post headlined!

[ljm2002]

40. No one denied the story...

...for example, David Axelrod has not said that he was misquoted. The White House "denial" merely claims that what Axelrod said is nothing new.

That is not a denial, that is a disagreement on how to spin it.

[jenmito]

34. K&R.

[jgraz]

37. Hell yeah! The President would NEVER abandon the Public Option.

Wait ... what?

Oh.

Nevermind.

[Meshuga]

41. Good

And I hope that is the case because it would be hard to swallow if Obama caved to Republicans on the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.

[Scurrilous]

42. K & R

:thumbsup:

[Vinnie From Indy]

43. I hope ALL DU'ers save this thread to their favorites

That way we can all come back and discuss which DU'ers were right and which were wrong.

I lay my bet on HuffPo being correct. I believe that the Obama people have already made a deal. As with most of their governing style, this deal was made in private.

[Time for change]

44. The key phrase by Pleiffer is

"Nothing has changed".

You might recall that in Obama's speech last week, he said that he will not approve "permanent" tax cuts for the rich. That's his loophole. It leaves him the option of approving "temporary" tax cuts for the rich. And that is specifically what the HuffPo interview suggested he would do. But "temporary" until when? Until he or some other Democratic president and Congress develops the political will to end them is what it means. If he extends them now, why on earth would anyone believe that he'll end them later, when we'll have much less support in Congress. This is bullshit, just like we've been getting from him since he was elected.