Sunday best: Bill Kristol wants to raise taxes on millionaires

Shocker! Influential conservative says the GOP should be willing to raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires

BY ALEX SEITZ-WALD

With the election over, the hot new thing that all the cool kids on the Sunday political chat shows were talking about today was the looming fiscal cliff and what Congress should do about it — and you’ll be surprised by one recommendation.

The tax increases and government spending cuts set to go into effect early next year are so massive that they could plunge the economy back into recession, unless Congress figures out a less painful way to reduce the deficit. The argument has so far broken down along the predictable partisan lines that we’ve seen in countless congressional battles over the past few years. Democrats want a balance of spending cuts and tax increases, while Republicans insist on zero tax increases, and maybe not even a dime in new revenue increases of any kind.

But just as the election has chastened Republicans on immigration, it may be doing the same thing on taxes. Bill Kristol, the editor of the Weekly Standard and one of the most prominent establishment conservative voices in Washington, threw the door wide open to tax hikes as part of fiscal cliff negotiations today. “It won’t kill the country if we raise taxes a little bit on millionaires … It really won’t, I don’t think. I don’t really understand why Republicans don’t take Obama’s offer,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”

He continued: “Really? The Republican Party is going to fall on its sword to defend a bunch of millionaires, half of whom voted Democratic and half of whom live in Hollywood and are hostile?” It’s a remarkable statement, coming from Kristol.

read more:
http://www.salon.com/2012/11/11/sunday_best_gop_open_to_raising_taxes/