it s like i m seeing the disaster playing out in slow motion. i d love to be wrong, but i think we are sinking fast and we haven t hit anything yet. we are steering a scary course. little more than five weeks away from thehip hitting the sail. republicans and democrats are doing it. maybe something is going on behind the scenes. i m not seeing it. i am seeing a lot of iceberg. iceberg one, talking about the president not only sticking to his tax the rich, he is doubling down on it. insisting $1.6 trillion in re-knew as part of any end of the year budget fix and the economy can more than deal, though it is weaker than it was two weeks ago. when he delayed the hikes because at the time it was fragile and he couldn t deal. go figure. iceberg two. democrats want to go much further on tax hikes. that means not just higher rates on wealthier taxpayers, but shaking them down for still more dough limiting their deductions and write-offs. iceberg three not a hint of
in grand junction, colorado, the new plan is no income tax increase next year. neil: we know taxes will go up, healthcare law, medical devices and host of others. selling a home, assets, et cetera. what else? that s what we don t know. he s promising that for one year he won t raise incomes taxes. we know the tax increase in january could have been avoided if the democrats for two years, they could have made the tax cut permanent for foreign people, middle income people, left-handed people. they made it permanent for nobody. that telegraphs the plan. after a year they will let them go up on everyone. neil: two weeks ago we got in the issue of what is a tax hike? we were talking about all the special breaks, allowances, write-offs at some businesses
that the big entitlement programs will be there for the next generation we need to tighten the belt on discreti discretionary spending. i disagree. mitt romney s tax proposals, because he has said that he can cut taxes without blowing up the deficit, without being deficit neutral, and at the same time keep defense spending. yeah. increase the defense budget. how does that work? governor romney said he can lower marginal tax rates and generate offsetting revenue so we don t increase the side of the deficit. how do you generate that? you reduce the number of write-offs and loopholes in some combinations. which would you reduce? he s not been specific. he s provided more specificity than the president and any candidate. he s not specific about which deductions. one of the things he s said is a mechanism that limits val i of all itemized deductions might be one way to go. that s a way that you take a
expires tax rates and budget cuts, hop on to it. and a republican senator agrees with that. what is the right deal for you? not the direction that senator schumer is talking about chuck schumer has carved out a place for himself well outside the main stream arguing that this is no scenario where we can lower the marginal rates which is inconsistent with what every bipartisan group has looked at to addressing our budget problem on the tax side. the rational thing to do is to have a more pro growth sensible tax policy with lower marginal rates and offset the lost revenue by squeezing the value of deductions and write offs and loopholes. that is the way to generate revenue. to keep marginal rates as he has advocated, even, to raise them above where they, that is counterproductive for economic growth. neil: he is talking about
he was willing to let detroit go bankrupt. i don t think he understood that saving the automobile worker, the saving the industry, what it meant to all of america, not just auto workers. i think he saw it the bain way. i mean this sincerely. i think he saw it in terms of balance sheets and write-offs. for more on the bain way, i m joined by the author of the rolling stone cover story greed and debt. the true story of mitt romney and bain capital. matt taibbi contributing editor for rolling stone. what is the bain way?