The Wall Street Journal, here, is describing this flip as a shift.
I'll say, like a mountain shifting, or a Giant Foo Bird shifting its entrails over your house:
Mitt Romney on Wednesday told an Ohio crowd that while he would work to lower tax rates on businesses and individuals, they shouldn’t “be expecting a huge cut in taxes because I’m also going to lower deductions and exemptions.”
The deductions we all fear losing are relatively common knowledge, like the home mortgage interest deduction. Romney has been cagey about this, on again off again about reducing the benefit for higher earners only. But this outburst sounds like cutting the deduction for those farther down the income ladder is possible.
Cuts to "exemptions" is an entirely new animal, however, and goes to the very heart of the tax code. Since Americans fought hard after WWII for the tax-filing category "Married Filing Jointly", the prop to families trying to raise children on one income has come under repeated attack, first under Nixon, and then from feminists who deplored the special tax status given to families. Gay and lesbian couples tirelessly work for recognition of their unions as marriages mostly because they want in on the tax preference.
It is extremely disappointing to hear Romney talk this way. It plays entirely into the hands of the opposition, who can use it to sow doubt in the minds of his would be supporters about whether Republicans will raise taxes on the middle class. I , for one, think Romney will say anything he thinks he has to in order to win votes, even if it is self-contradictory. But the fact of the matter is Romney was a tax equalizer in Massachusetts, which meant privileges for favored groups went out the window, and so fees went up on businesses and taxes went up on properties to adjust to his leveling programs.
With Rush Limbaugh candidly letting it slip today that the middle class has been pandered to through the tax code, the drumbeat against the people grows in intensity.
And the dupes will vote for it.
