For Democrats wavering in their resolve to end the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, shocking new data from the IRS should hopefully stiffen their backbones. Between 2001 and 2007, the 400 richest taxpayers doubled their annual incomes to an average of $345 million, while their effective tax rate plummeted to only 16.6% from […]

Thursday's suicide airplane attack on the Austin office of the Internal Revenue Service by a disgruntled tax protester has once again focused attention on dangerously inflammatory anti-IRS rhetoric. To be sure, the language was threatening. "Gestapo-like tactics." "The IRS is out of control!" "Which would you prefer: having your wallet or purse stolen or being […]

Back in January, a CNN poll revealed that "nearly three out of four Americans think that at least half of the money spent in the federal stimulus plan has been wasted." But one year after the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was signed into law, the numbers - and the overwhelming consensus […]

Last week, former Bush speechwriter and full-time torture apologist Marc Thiessen introduced perhaps the most comically hypocritical talking point in the perpetual Republican jihad against the Obama administration's war policies. In "Dead Terrorists Tell No Tales," Thiessen fretted that under President Obama, the United States is killing its enemies before getting a chance to torture […]

If Joe Lieberman was the biggest ingrate in American politics, Samuel "Joe the Plumber" Wurzelbacher is surely now the first. While Lieberman betrayed Barack Obama only months after Obama campaigned for him in Connecticut, the Plumber turned Tea Bagger has now turned his back on John McCain and Sarah Palin. Which can only mean that […]

Back in September, "10 Lessons for Tea Baggers" documented a set of inescapable truths which the frothing-at-the-mouth followers of the Tea Party movement nevertheless manage to deny. Number one on that list then and now is "President Obama cut your taxes." As Steve Benen related today, the Tea Baggers themselves and their ideological water carriers […]

Three months after the launch of his Freedom First PAC, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty with his interview in Esquire took another step towards a bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012. But while the Washington Post's Chris Cillizza lauded Pawlenty's "stinging critique of GOP," in words and deeds the man who calls himself "T-Paw" […]

Back in October, Republicans leaders slammed party chief Michael Steele for his "Seniors' Bill of Rights" which promised "no cuts to Medicare." Not because they weren't issuing dire - and mythical - warnings that Democrats were "sticking it to seniors with cuts to Medicare." No, the GOP brain trust was furious precisely because Steele's was […]

Back in 1999, the New Republic displayed then Governor George W. Bush in a dunce cap to tout its cover story, "Why America Loves Stupid Candidates." Judging by David Broder's fawning paean to Sarah Palin today in the Washington Post, it may be time to debate the stupid candidate thesis again. Ironically, Broder's ode to […]

In case you missed the reaction to Robert Gibbs' lighthearted mockery of Sarah Palin's "telepalmter", the White House press corps has a new rule. NBC's Chuck Todd, who previously defended Palin by declaring, "We've all done notes," protested Wednesday "I was surprised by the stunt myself." In her report, CNN's Suzanne Malveaux groused, "so much […]