David Brooks sees some of the same problems I saw with Hillary’s and Obama’s answers about taxes at the Philadelphia debate:
Both promised to not raise taxes on those making less than $200,000 or $250,000 a year. They both just emasculated their domestic programs. Returning the rich to their Clinton-era tax rates will yield, at best, $40 billion a year in revenue. It’s impossible to fund a health care plan, let alone anything else, with that kind of money. The consequences are clear: if elected they will have to break their pledge, and thus destroy their credibility, or run a minimalist administration.
Just recall the kind of tax hikes Obama has admitted will be needed just to pay for his health care plan. (And go here, here and here for a reminder of how the Democrats are handling the tax issue at the state level). Ed Morrissey rounds up more as well on the other problem I noted: that the candidates, especially Obama, had already broken these pledges to not raise taxes on voters making under $200,000 a year by the next series of questions, when Obama endorsed (and Hillary refused to rule out) raising the capital gains tax, which of course you don’t need a high income to pay (many retirees pay more in capital gains than income taxes).