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| John Boehner set for new term as speaker as 113th Congress convenes - The Guardian Posted: 03 Jan 2013 08:27 AM PST Ewen MacAskill in Washington  US House minority leader Nancy Pelosi arrives for the 113th Congress prayer service at St Peter's Catholic church in Washington. Photograph: Joshua Roberts/Reuters John Boehner was almost certain to be re-elected for another term as speaker of the House of Representatives on Wednesday, despite a rancorous end to the fiscal cliff crisis and fury among some fellow Republicans over his failure to schedule a vote on relief funds for Hurricane Sandy victims. As the 113th Congress was due to be sworn in, it looked likely that Boehner would be unopposed. But he was unlikely to secure the unanimous support of his party he enjoyed last time round: at least one Republican has gone on the record to say he will not vote for him. Some of his House colleagues hold personal grudges, having been removed from committee jobs, and some are simply disenchanted with his performance. But others who had earlier threatened to vote against him, such as the New York congressman Pete King, have come round, in King's case because Boehner relented and scheduled a vote on Sandy aid for Friday. "John will be re-elected Speaker. John is a voice of reason in our conference, despite some of the things I said yesterday," said King on NBC on Thursday morning. The failure of Bohener to schedule a vote on Sandy aid this week drew a furious response from the Republican governor of New Jersey, Chris Christie. In a 40-minute news conference on Wednesday, Christie railed against the "toxic internal politics" of the House majority. After Christie's comments, Boehner and House majority leader Eric Cantor hurriedly announced there would be two votes on Sandy aid: one on Friday, which will release $9bn for the national flood insurance programme, and another in the first full business day of the new Congress, on 15 January, for a remaining $51bn in the package. Boehner and Cantor met members on Congress from Sandy-affected areas on Wednesday in an attempt to assuage their concerns. "Getting critical aid to the victims of Hurricane Sandy should be the first priority in the new Congress, and that was reaffirmed today with members of the New York and New Jersey delegations," Cantor said after the meeting. The 113th Congress is more diverse than the 112th in terms of race, gender and sexual preferences, but the political make-up is not significantly different. There are a few more Democrats in the Senate and House and fewer Tea Party-backed Republicans in the House, but overall the balance remains much the same. That means the 113th Congress could end up being as unproductive as the 112th, dominated by new showdowns over spending cuts and raising the debt ceiling, eating into time Barack Obama wants for his ambitious programme that includes immigration reform and gun control. The new Congress begins with a rollcall vote for new members followed by a swearing-in ceremony at noon. There will be 82 new members in the House and 12 in the Senate. Among members of Congress departing are Ron Paul, the libertarian who fought for the Republican presidential nomination last year, Dennis Kucinich, who sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, and senator Jim DeMint, the godfather of the Tea Party. The new Congress will see white men as a minority among House Democrats, reflecting the increase in the ranks of women and Latinos. But a more balanced Congress still has a long way to go, with only one black senator, Tim Scott, who replaces DeMint who has opted to stand down without completing his term. The new Congress has a Hindu, a Buddhist – and the return, after a short gap, of a Kennedy, Joseph. Democrat Tammy Baldwin is the first openly gay candidate elected to the Senate. Democrats Tammy Duckworth and Tulsi Gabbard will be the first female combat veterans to serve in Congress. |
| Obama Turns Back On Tax Fairness - Forbes Posted: 03 Jan 2013 08:33 AM PST  President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden after the Fiscal Cliff deal passed in the House of Representatives on January 1. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife) "Everyone pays their fair share. Everyone does their part," said President Obama after Congress extended most of the Bush tax cuts at the last minute. Really? Let's look at the effect of the fiscal cliff deal on two hypothetical taxpayers representing large groups of real people. Amy is a freelance graphic designer making $50,000 annually. Her Social Security and Medicare taxes have just risen by two percentage points, from 13.3% to 15.3%. Ben is a business executive making $200,000 annually. His Social Security and Medicare taxes have just gone up by 1.1% of total income, maxing out at 7.65% of wages up to $113,700. Anything above that cap is not subject to payroll taxes. And Ben's employer pays an equal share, while Amy is responsible for both the employee and employer portions. The increase in the payroll tax will be the fiscal cliff's sole effect on Ben's and Amy's tax burden. Amy will pay $7,065 in payroll taxes this year. Ben, who will gross four times what Amy does, will pay $8,698, just like Warren Buffett. Does that sound fair? Not to Milton Friedman, who called the contribution scheme needlessly regressive as part of his attack on Social Security. That was in 1962. Since then, the payroll taxes have only become much less equitable. As the rate kicking in with the first dollar of earned income has shot up, payroll levies have become a much bigger part of the total tax burden. Ostensibly, the contribution is capped because so are the benefits, under a formula designed to make Social Security resemble a contribution pension scheme, even though it's nothing of the sort. Amy and Ben aren't contributing toward their own Social Security benefits. Instead, they are funding the benefits already going out the door. And it's not clear why this burden must be shouldered based on a benefits formula that may or may not apply down the line rather than their present means. As a presidential candidate in 2007, Barack Obama initially supported doing away with a payroll tax cap. "Only 6% of Americans make more than $97,000—so 6% is not the middle class—it's the upper class," he said at a debate in Las Vegas. But Hillary Clinton accused him of advocating a trillion-dollar tax increase on "middle-class families" like those of firefighters and school supervisors, and so Obama eventually said additional payroll taxes only ought to be imposed on income above $250,000, the total he'd already promised to shield from higher taxes. Of course, a position that proved controversial in the Democratic primary never had a chance in Congress. Nevertheless Obama revisited the cap hike in September while addressing a forum sponsored by the American Association of Retired Persons, minus pesky details. And then he went out and secured a regressive payroll tax hike for everyone. The next time Obama returns to the subject will be, I imagine, in his memoirs. He's a centrist and a pragmatist, after all, and plenty of Democrats from affluent blue states can't stomach a 7.65% tax increase, be it on incomes above $113,700 or $250,000. But the Congressional Research Service found in 2010 that doing away with the payroll tax cap would keep Social Security solvent for at least the next 75 years. Remember that the next time someone claims the only way to put things right is to curb benefits. More on Forbes: |
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