These Taxing Times

Eugene Robinson reluctantly supports the passage of the tax deal worked out between the White House and Congressional Rethuglicans in his column today. There may still be opportunities to remove some of the most offensive give-aways, like the estate tax break for multi-millionaires (which even the Rethugs never made much of an issue of). Votes will probably occur by the middle of next week, and most people are predicting extension of all of the Bushit tax cuts.

In the meantime, the anger of House Dems at the White House's bypassing of them is real. So too is the President's progressive base, which perceives him as always throwing in the towel after the first round of a fight that the other side usually picks. He also might want to steer clear of gratuitous insults to his base in the future, as Robinson says:

"I believe the White House continues to underestimate the anger and disillusionment among the party's loyal base - and the need for some victories, or at least some heroic battles, to lift the spirits of the faithful. Obama needs to train his newfound passion and outrage on his foes in the GOP, not on the friends and supporters that his press secretary once derisively called the 'professional left.'"

Yes, "his newfound passion and outrage." Getting slapped around by Rethugs and other righties for two years, and then lashing out at your supporters when they want you to fight back, isn't going to help you at the polls in 2012.