The Week

For the first time in history a U.S. President has increased taxes effective three weeks before taking office, and cut spending in the years after leaving it. Now that is a bipartisan budget policy.

Are Bill Clinton’s retroactive tax hikes the disaster portrayed by Bob Dole? The New York Times puts it into perspective: although the “Retroactive tax hikes aren’t fair to a handful of wealthy Americans,” the “deficit-reduction bill is chock full of other arbitrary, ill-advised provisions.” So “fairness” consists of being unfair to all. Well, it’s an argument.