September Porker of the Month Named
Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) defines Porker of the Month as “a dubious honor given to lawmakers, government officials, and political candidates who have shown a blatant disregard for the interests of taxpayers.” According to CAGW, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) was selected “for leading the effort to postpone a debate on extending the Bush tax cuts and creating more uncertainly in the economy at a time when taxpayers and businesses have been clamoring for clarity. The abdication of leadership on this issue is likely to add to taxpayers’ angst in the final months of 2010.”
The justification for awarding September 2010’s Porker of the Month to Sen. Durbin follows:
“According to a September 27, 2010 article in The Washington Times, “Democrats said Sunday that they will put off until after the elections a vote on whether to extend the Bush tax cuts, leaving most taxpayers in limbo for months as to whether they'll face tax increases at the beginning of next year.” Sen. Durbin told CNN's “State of the Union,” “We want to basically say after the election, when we still face a deadline by the end of the year, we'll take up all of these tax issues.”
“The debate over how and when to address expiring tax cuts intensified over the last several weeks as the December 31, 2010 deadline approached for the pre-election congressional recess. The disposition of the tax cuts is especially important to businesses of all sizes, which cannot plan ahead without knowing the tax consequences of their decisions. Yet, Congress has done nothing to preserve them. Even President Obama's former Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag has stated his preference for extending the tax cuts even though Orszag does not favor making them permanent. Orszag opined in a September 6, 2010 New York Times op-ed that allowing any of the Bush tax cuts to expire now would “make an already stagnating jobs market worse over the next year or two, which is exactly what would happen if the cuts expire as planned.”
“On September 20, 2010, CNN Money released the results of a survey it conducted among 31 leading economists. The majority of those CNN surveyed stressed that the tax cuts should be renewed for everyone. “Americans are being forced to tighten their belts while the economy is limping along, but that doesn't deter porkers and big government advocates in Congress, like Sen. Durbin, from increasing the amount of uncertainty taxpayers already face in a sluggish economic recovery,” said CAGW President Tom Schatz. “By failing to expeditiously consider what to do with the Bush tax cuts, Sen. Durbin and other politicians in Congress are contributing negatively to the anemic economy. Most Americans support an extension of all of the tax cuts and renewed efforts to restrain the growth of government spending. This Congress, still completely out to lunch when it comes to the plight of average Americans, is holding taxpayers and the economy hostage while they play politics in the run-up to the elections,” concluded Schatz.”
To see how cartoonist Henry Payne thinks Congress addressed the budget crisis,” click here. To contact, Sen. Durbin’s office on Capitol Hill, call (202) 224-2152.