#grovernorquist

[vt31008]

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[countymn]

For candidates, campaign season means questionnaire season | minnesota.allembru.com

[preachdotcom-blog-blog]

As of late, many Republicans are showing a willingness to go against the Norquist Anti-tax Pledge. Upon assuming office, an overwhelming majority of Republicans usually take this pledge by Grover Norquist to ensure that they will take a stand against raising taxes no matter the cost. Bob Corker and many other Republicans in Congress are now rejecting the pledge, saying their priority is to do what is best for their country and their constituents even if it means raising taxes on certain individuals. Congressman Peter King and Senator Saxby Chambliss, both Republicans, have said that this pledge is no longer relevant. Grover Norquist has tried to take a stern stance in order to deter the rumblings of his coalition weakening. Norquist has stated that the pledge is supposed to be a lifelong pledge, but others are arguing that it is no longer viable to the strengthening of this nation [fiscally]. 

[yostivanich]

Chambliss isn’t the only Republican openly defying Norquist. As The Hill recently reported, the number of supporters of Norquist’s pledge is down in both the House and Senate, with a dozen incoming freshman Republicans in the House having refused to sign on. It’s hard to say whether this represents a growing trend, or merely a change in tactics. The end-game for Grover, as always, in his infamous words, to shrink the government “down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” If he now thinks the best way get there would be to trade a small increase in taxes in exchange for steep, debilitating cuts in social insurance programs like Social Security and Medicare, then maybe the apparent split between Norquist and Republicans like Chambliss is all kabuki. Certainly, of all the changes the G.O.P. might make to broaden its base, it seems to me that any changes in its basic economic orientation are most unlikely. The alliances between the Republican Party and wealthy corporations and individuals are the strongest, deepest, and most powerful ties that party has, so I doubt anything very fundamental will change there. But the fate of Grover Norquist specifically and his no-tax-increases-at-any-cost ideology in general certainly bears continuing scrutiny.

[yostivanich]

Two meetings in Washington today tell the story of the decline of Grover Norquist, the conservative activist who is now seeing his near-iron grip on GOP tax policy over the past two decades slipping. One is Norquist’s weekly “Wednesday Meeting,” a gathering of “more than 150 elected officials, political activists, and movement leaders” who plot strategy and coordinate messaging every week. After big losses at the polls in last week’s election and a fracturing conservative base just as Congress heads into its most important tax negotiations in years, it’s safe to assume that this morning’s meeting was tense. There was a time when almost every single elected Republican in Washington and even state capitols would sign Norquist’s anti-tax pledge, which holds elected officials to never ever raise taxes under any circumstance. As recently as last year’s negotiations over the debt ceiling, Norquist had a majority in the House of Representatives, including Speaker John Boehner and the entire GOP leadership. 60 Minutes’ Steve Kroft labeled Norquist “the most powerful man in Washington.” Those who violate the pledge can expect to face attack ads aimed at unseating them bankrolled by Norquist’s massive war chest (Americans for Tax Reform spent almost $16 million on independent expenditure ads in 2012), and violating it has often been a deal-breaker in GOP primaries in the past. But times are changing. The other meeting is taking place a few blocks away from Norquist’s downtown D.C. headquarters, at the White House, where President Obama is meeting with a dozen CEOs of the country’s biggest corporations. How did Norquist react to news of Obama reaching out to the business community, which he aims to represent in Washington? Not positively. Norquist told the Washington Post the CEOs were “acting like a group of trained seals” for Obama, posing for a “photo op” to give the president cover. You’d think Norquist would be happy that Obama is giving an audience to the titans of the private sector, but no. That’s because the meeting, which gives the president a chance to win some business support for his agenda without any input from Norquist, represents a threat to his personal power. Is his petulant reaction — he invoked the term “poopy head” on national TV on Monday — a sign that he’s losing his once awesome power over the nation’s capital? Maybe. Norquist faces an unprecedented rearguard attack from a congressional GOP fracturing on the tax issue. Last year, there were 238 members of the House and 41 members of the Senate who had signed Norquist’s pledge. This year, there are just 217 in the House — one shy from the 218 needed for a majority — and 39 in the Senate, an all time low. As The Hill’s Russell Berman reports, while Norquist claims his army is 219 strong in the House, two of those members have since disavowed Norquist’s pledge. Democrats are hoping to exploit GOP divisions to push for tax increases on the wealthy during the lame duck session of Congress. “More and more people on the hill are realizing that Norquist is a has-been, and the outcome of the fiscal cliff will probably consign him to the footnote status he’s always deserved,” a senior Democratic aide told Salon. The true scale of the desertion from Norquist’s pledge is actually obscured by GOP losses in the House. At least a dozen of the House Republicans’ top recruits, touted as “Young Guns,” declined to sign the pledge this year. Norquist’s group spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on ads explicitly defending candidates like California Republican Ricky Gill and Georgia Republican Lee Anderson against flak they were taking for signing the pledge. Both lost. And back in Washington, where signing the pledge was once de rigueur, Republicans have been increasingly bold in rebuking Norquist. Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn has long been a sharp critic of the pledge’s inflexibility – “Grover, you’re stupid,” is just a sample — but now he’s being joined by his a growing roster of his colleagues. “Grover Norquist has no credibility, so I don’t respond to him. He doesn’t deserve being responded to” said Georgia Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss. “Simply put, I believe Mr. Norquist is connected with and has profited from a number of unsavory people and groups out of the mainstream,” said longtime Virginia Republican Rep. Frank Wolf on the House floor. Several members have even retreated from the pledge, such as Minnesota Rep. Chip Cravaack, who came in in 2010 and had one of the nation’s highest profile races this year. “I have learned, never sign a damn pledge,” he said this spring when asked about Norquist’s pledge. Cravaack lost. Indeed, the pledge came up in a number of races and there’s some evidence that it proved to be a political liability. And it’s not just in rhetoric. Norquist faced one of the biggest legislative tests of his power when a subsidy for ethanol production came up for renewal last year. He staunchly opposed it, saying eliminating the tax subsidy would be a de facto tax increase and thus a violation of the pledge, but Republicans joined Democrats to kill the subsidy anyway. Norquist has also been rebuked on looming military cuts that will automatically take effect at the end of the year if congress and the president fail to reach a budget deal. Republican hawks like Sen. Lindsay Graham of South Carolina have said they’re willing to raise taxes to preserve Pentagon funding. Asked about the how this would conflict with the pledge this summer, Graham shrugged and said, “I’ve crossed the Rubicon on that.” Today, even Sen. John McCain said at the Washington Ideas Forum that “fewer and fewer people are signing this [Norquist] pledge” — “somewhat triumphantly,” the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein noted. Even former president George H.W. Bush and his son, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, an early 2016 favorite for the GOP nomination, have disowned Norquist publically. “The rigidity of those pledges is something I don’t like. The circumstances change and you can’t be wedded to some formula by Grover Norquist. It’s — who the hell is Grover Norquist, anyway?” the senior Bush told Parade Magazine in July. “The pledge was presented to me three times. I never signed the pledge,” the younger Bush testified to Congress in June. “I don’t believe you outsource your principles and convictions to people.” Of course, the tide has been turning against Norquist for some time, and his demise has been predicted before. But this crisis moment in Washington looks a lot like a breaking point for the anti-tax agenda. Speaker Boehner has already indicated willingness to increase revenues and the consensus among Washington power brokers that taxes on the wealthy will go up one way or the other, even rates stay the same. Indeed, President Obama has vowed to veto anything doesn’t. And the problem with a hardline pledge like Norquist’s is that is intentionally leaves no room for flexibility, so once the dam cracks, it can break wide open

[yostivanich]

Grover Norquist made headlines Monday night for saying that while he thinks a "carbon tax swap" in which such a tax finances cuts to the income tax is bad policy, he doesn't think it violates his anti-tax pledge. This isn't as big a deal as you might think, not least because the chances of a carbon tax were always slim, but it does raise the question: What would a carbon tax swap actually look like? A paper in August by MIT'sSebastian Rausch and John M. Reilly which Brad highlighted upon release asks how much you could cut various taxes if you imposed a carbon tax, starting at $20 per ton in 2013 and increasing by 4 percent every year thereafter. The answer: not that much.

[yostivanich]

Grover Norquist on Monday described Mitt Romney as a “poopy head” as the anti-tax crusader tried to strip President Barack Obama of any mandate. “The president was elected on the basis that he was not Romney and that Romney was a poopy-head and you should vote against Romney,” Norquist said on CBS’s “This Morning.” “[Obama] won by two points, but he didn’t make the case for higher taxes and higher spending. He kind of sounded like the opposite.” The president campaigned for reelection on ending the Bush-era tax cuts for incomes above $250,000, and has said he would veto any extension of those rates, which would likely be part of any deal to avert the fiscal cliff. Obama also said tax hikes would be needed as part of a “balanced” approach to deficit reduction, which would include spending cuts. But during a series of appearance on morning TV shows, Norquist, the leader of Americans for Tax Reform, tried to put the brakes on any deal that would include tax rate increases. At one point, he mischaracterized Obama’s positions. “Obama is not interested in taxing the rich,” Norquist said on CBS. “He admits there’s no money there. He runs a $6.7 trillion debt assuming he raises taxes on high-income people.” Norquist said Obama actually wanted to target the middle class with energy taxes. Earlier this year, Obama proposed a rule named after investor Warren Buffett, which would require the rich to pay more in taxes. Norquist also defended the group’s anti-tax pledge and made his case that boosting rates wouldn’t address the bigger issue facing Washington policymakers: out-of-control spending.

[metzcher]

>A growing number of GOP lawmakers have disavowed Norquist’s pledge against supporting tax increases in recent days, telling The Hill they no longer feel bound to uphold a document that they signed, in some cases, more than a decade ago. >"I haven’t signed it since 1994," Rep. Steven LaTourette (R-Ohio) said, explaining that he didn’t even remember endorsing the pledge until Americans for Tax Reform produced the original document earlier this year. "My driver’s license expires. The milk in my refrigerator expires. My gym membership expires, and I find the website to be a little deceptive,” LaTourette said. Here's the thing about signing a *pledge* or a taking an oath: It doesn't expire unless it says that it expires. Perhaps if LaTourette (and others) had had enough courage to think for themselves, rather than allowing someone to force them to sign a silly pledge, they (and the country) wouldn't be in this mess. The only pledge that an elected representative should be taking is the one that binds them to protecting and defending the Constitution. If I signed a pledge, I'd remember it. LaTourette claims that he doesn't remember signing it, and that's likely because he did whatever he had to do, without even thinking, in order to gain Norquist's support. Is that the kind of person who should be representing others? He's a follower, not a leader, and his attitude with regard to pledging that he'll do something leaves a lot to be desired. If he'll say anything to get elected, can he be trusted? I don't think so, but (thankfully) he doesn't represent me. Signing pledges is always a bad move in government. Times change. Circumstances change. If you give up your ability to be agile and evolve over time, you are useless as a lawmaker. Hopefully, LaTourette and his friends have learned their lesson. Now maybe they'll ditch Norquist and start thinking for themselves. They can start by thinking about what would be best for their constituents rather than asking themselves what Grover Norquist would do.