jerseyhoya wrote:Mitch Daniels open to VAT, oil tax hike

I think at this point I'm down to four for my first choice

In this order: Christie, Daniels, Jindal, Pawlenty

Pawlenty is definitely running so I don't need to go past him, wouldn't be surprised if the other three don't

I don't think Christie will run...I really hope Mitch does

Monkeyboy wrote:Did anyone else see the 3-part interview with Cantor on the Daily Show? It's a shame you have to turn on Comedy Central to find interesting political discourse.

Here it is at Talking Points Memo. I tried to find it on the Comedy Central website, but they only seemed to have two of the parts.

Stewart interviews Cantor

jerseyhoya wrote:I just got polled. Heady times.

Wonder if it's public or private polling.

In the N=1 sample size of my household, Runyan is leading Adler by the astounding margin of 100-0%.

Let’s raise the retirement age, he says. Let’s reduce Social Security for the rich. And let’s reconsider our military commitments, too. When I ask about taxes—in 2005 Daniels proposed a hike on the $100,000-plus crowd, which his own party promptly torpedoed—he refuses to revert to Republican talking points. “At some stage there could well be a tax increase,” he says with a sigh. “They say we can’t have grown-up conversations anymore. I think we can.”

...
Sane fiscal conservatives know that some kind of VAT may well be essential if we are to get some kind of balanced budget in the future without jacking up income tax rates to the heavens. And taxing consumption is better in my view than taxing income. Still, the real point is that all this should be debatable, if conservatism is going to regenerate as a serious governing philosophy, rather than as a formula for media success. But here is Grover Norquist's head exploding in response:

“This is outside the bounds of acceptable modern Republican thought, and it is only the zone of extremely left-wing Democrats who publicly talk about those things because all Democrats pretending to be moderates wouldn’t touch it with a 10-foot poll. Absent some explanation, such as large quantities of crystal meth, this is disqualifying. This is beyond the pale.”

Notice the formulation: that there are "boundaries of acceptable modern Republican thought." Yes, this is a church or a party? And Norquist may not be the Pope (that would be Limbaugh) but he is in the college of cardinals). And notice the extreme rhetoric accusing Daniels of being on "crystal meth". Daniels also spoke last week of a possible gas tax:

“One fully justifiable tax would be on imported oil.”

Daniels, in other words, represents both the hope of the GOP and the most damning evidence that right now, it's hopeless.

Alaska Republican Senate nominee Joe Miller was asked about illegal immigration at his town hall yesterday, and he said that the country's first priority should be to secure the border. "If East Germany could, we could," he said.

So that’s what we want is a secure and sovereign nation and, you know, I don’t know that all of you are Latino. Some of you look a little more Asian to me. I don’t know that. [Note: it's the Hispanic Student Union. The whole room is Hispanic teenagers.] What we know, what we know about ourselves is that we are a melting pot in this country. My grandchildren are evidence of that. I’m evidence of that. I’ve been called the first Asian legislator in our Nevada State Assembly."