So Obama has managed to cobble together a "compromise" that has drawn filibuster threats from both Jim DeMint and Bernie Sanders. Of course, judging by his demeanor and tone at the presser today, he might filibuster it himself were he still in the Senate. Exactly who LIKES the deal?
More seriously, I think DeMint sniffs blood in the water. He knows that the average paycheck in America is going to be missing a couple of hundred dollars per two-week pay period unless something is done about it. Here's the bottom line: if Obama lets that happen, the only people who will tell pollsters the approve of him are those who have no paychecks, and thus no little box marked "withholding" with a startlingly high number in it. Unemployment is high, but not THAT high. Sensing leverage, DeMint wants to push to make all the tax cuts permanent. It's a high-stakes game, but the Republicans are holding a very good hand.

I could not agree more with DeMint. The permanent economy line is exactly why too. I am a business owner. I have to plan my future, my future budgets, my future growth plans. I don't plan for the short term. I plan for the long term. A short term change in tax rates will NOT change my behavior in any way. I will increase my spending, hiring, or growth plans based on a short term tax picture.

People are forgetting the massive headwinds that the Obamacare law, and financial regulation law are putting on the economy now, and in the future. Krauthammer tonight on Fox was talking as if he thinks the economy will boom now as a result of this deal. I think he's dead wrong. There are so many costly things coming down on us right now, and so many rules to tie up our workers hours, that the hope of a booming economy is silly. It ain't going to happen. The best we can hope for is anemic growth.

I love DeMint but he is wrong on this issue. Get the tax cuts in now and deal with the spending cuts to pay for it when the GOP takes over the House in January. Let the Dems block it if they have the guts and they'll be on the record for raising taxes on the middle class. If the Repubs join them in blocking it diffuses the blame with independents.

DeMint’s rationale makes little sense. There GOP and Conservatives couldn’t realistically hope for a better deal on taxes while Obama is in the White House. DeMint’s argument that the tax cuts should be permanent is correct, but that’s beside the point since the GOP will never get permanent tax cuts with a Democratic president. Strategically, the GOP should accept the 2 year deal, use making those tax cuts permanent a 2012 campaign issue, and then do just that once the GOP takes the White House (I’m an optimist!).

DeMint is also right that we should have paid for it. The one point that the Dems have in their favor is that extending the tax cuts won’t help the deficit in the short term. I would rather the GOP have coupled the tax cut extension with deep spending cuts, but again that wasn’t a realistic deal with Obama. DeMint and others should accept this deal and then work on making spending cuts a priority in 2011, forcing Obama to either veto or accept those cuts.

If he wanted a "permanent" tax cut the time to push for it was years ago, when these rates were put through with this sunset deadline.

My family has been working with a 10% paycut for over a year, the last thing I need is to have LESS money in January, while people let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Nothing is perfect, nothing besides death is permanent, we won, the left loss, shut up, vote and GO HOME for the holidays.

This makes so mad I could spit.

DeMint's arguments belong to the 2012 election.

In December 2010, however, reality is that this deal is the only deal available.

Insisting upon the impossible -- achieving a thorough transformation of the government instantaneously -- is the best way for DeMint to marginalize himself and, by spoiling our chances for 2012, thereby ruining the possibility of achieving a thorough transforming government within one presidential election cycle.

"In December 2010, however, reality is that this deal is the only deal available."

Assuming that's correct, its not obvious that the only deal available is one we ought to take. What is the deal here? That in return for putting $300 million on Uncle Sams credit card (the unemployment benefits), we keep the lower tax rate on top earners for another two years. It's far from clear to me that is either a good bargain or good for the country.

(Obama) is still a dangerous snake. He lied to take office, perpetrated great fraud against a lathered up national mob, furious and padded with Bush haters who swallowed the Dem's Koolaid. He then threw in his gauzy, bogus fable of 'Hope & Change', screaming it out across the air waves, shot from below to look 'bigger than life' by the screwy, lefty press, some of whom still slobber over him, hoping against hope for.....what? For two endless years on the campaign trail, he looked like an evangelist or heroic locker room Coach and America for some reason swallowed it all, like dopes, hook line and sinker in spite of his recorded radicalism, all caught on video tape which is readily available to anyone not too lazy to look for it. And he combined his well scripted, baloney ridden campaign strategy with the one other important thing the Democratic party chose him expressly for...his color. The whites loved him, the blaks worshiped him and I thought, 'huh? Hope & wha.....?" Anything he does to 'move center' should be discounted as more deceitful behavior and advice he's taking from FOX, the station which his administration uses to shape policy. How can a nation EVER take a racist seriously again? A President that called us racist and who uses class warfare to pit the races against one another. Our first openly Marxist President is also a cheap con artist and flim-flam man.

Don't trust him is an understatement. I would vote him out even if he did away with income tax and balanced the budget. Because you know what? He'd still be 'up to something'.

You would think after years and years of being told that half a loaf is better than none, that people would realize all they end up with is crumbs. With this supposed grand compromise, estate taxes rise are raised 35%, deficit spending is increased yet again, and although income taxes are not raised, no stimulatory activity will occur simply because it just preserves the status quo and kicks the expiration date 2 years down the road. Additionally, Obama's payroll tax holiday deprives the Social Security Ponzi scheme of money, hastening its inevitable collapse.
This deal, combined with the announcement by the House Republican Steering Committee of Hal Rogers as Chair of the Appropriations Committee and Fred Upton as Chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee shows that not only didn't Obama get the message of the 2010 elections, neither did Senator McConnell, Speaker in waiting Boehner, and Representative Ryan. And the new mantra that we'll just primary them in 2012 begs the question - Charlie Brown, how many times are you going to let Lucy pull that football away from you?