Democrats and Tax Cuts for the Rich

Just keep in mind, amidst all of the inane debate over Obama's "strategic" moves, that the Democrats had two years to deal with the Bush tax cut fiasco. Two years in which they had, at one point, a filibuster-proof supermajority in the Senate and massive majorities in the House. House Democrats refused to vote on the tax issue before the November elections. Senate Democrats didn't even publicly agree amongst themselves about whether to give more tax breaks to the rich. Obama, as usual, concedes 90% of his ground up front and expects to get lucky and win 10% of what he was after in the first place (which is usually itself weaksauce). Obama won in 2008 in Indiana and West Virginia, in particular, because he campaigned on the idea of taxing the rich and using it to fund expanded health care coverage. It now turns out that he's not going to follow through on either.

There should be no doubt that the tax cuts should expire for the richest of the rich. The conservatism of the Democrats on this question should be a wakeup call to progressives who still feel compelled to apologize for Obama and Congress.