As Steve Benen did such a wonderful job of explaining in his post this Monday, Republicans continually claim to be the anti-tax party, but that label should come with an asterisk, because they really don't mind raising taxes on the poor. Those moochers had better get "some skin in the game" or else.

Case in point, one Rep. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.) who apparently decided that Mitt Romney didn't piss off quite enough Americans during the last election with his 47 percent remarks.

When Republicans endorse tax increases:

But as those who watch Republican politics closely know, the anti-tax rule needs an asterisk. The party hates tax increases with every fiber of its being, unless you're poor. Luke Johnson flagged this quote from Rep. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.).

"You know, folks mock Mitt Romney for what he said, but he's right. Forty-seven percent of American citizens pay zero in income taxes. It's just true," Woodall said, according to remarks recorded by Georgia Fair Share. [...]

"In fact, the bottom 30% of American citizens profit from the tax code because they're getting refundable tax credits back," Woodall says in the video. "I don't care if you're paying a dollar. You need to believe that you are involved in the process, and you need to have skin in the game."

There are a couple of relevant angles to this. First, Romney's "47 percent" thesis wasn't just the percentage of Americans who don't pay income taxes; it was also about characterizing nearly half the country, including seniors and veterans, as lazy parasites.

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Republicans have done a whole lot of things to damage their "brand" and still haven't figured out what to do to quit being the "stupid party" after their losses in the last election, but note to Kathleen Parker -- refusing to raise taxes in order to lower the budget deficit is not one of them. The majority of their own constituents don't agree with them on this issue, but that didn't stop Parker from pretending it would damage them on this Sunday's Meet the Press:

GREGORY: What's striking to me is that these issues are still so hard and that the elections didn't seem to solve them completely enough. […] Is that true? I mean, why didn't it?

PARKER: Why didn't it? Because, look, the Republicans cannot give on taxes. They simply can't. It would damage their brand permanently and the President is unwilling... he is insisting on raising revenue through taxes. There's no way for them to have a meeting of the minds when those differences exist and that's not going to change.

Republicans are not worried about damaging their brand on tax increases with anyone other than the members of the one percent who are paying to keep them in office.

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From this Sunday's Meet the Press, despite all of his rhetoric attempting to help the Republican party with their so-called rebranding effort, Eric Cantor didn't do a very good job of hiding just who his party is looking out for, and it sure as hell isn't the average worker out there: Cantor: We Can’t Raise Taxes ‘Every Three Months’:

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) said Sunday that he does not support bringing in new revenue by closing tax loopholes in order to avoid sequestration, during an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press."

"We can't be raising taxes every three months in this town," Cantor said, referring to the tax increases that went into effect in early January.

Cantor added that he doesn't want the sequester to go into effect and said it's up to President Obama to make a move now on avoiding it.

Politicususa has more on Cantor's interview here: Eric Cantor Embarrasses Himself Playing Sequester Blame Game and here: Hypocrisy Alert: Eric Cantor Added $3.4 Trillion to Debt But Blames Obama for His Debt. NBC has the full transcript up here, but for this segment, I think I prefer the Bobblespeak version.

Meet The Press - February 10, 2012 :

Gregory: the sequester automatic
spending cuts could happen in a
few days and would cripple
Virginia's economy

Audience: yes Virginia there
is a Sequester Clause

Cantor: these are horrible
indiscriminate cuts I supported

Gregory: so why can't you make
a deal with Obama?

Cantor: because Obama wants to raise taxes

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Surprise, surprise! It's all sour grapes over at Fox now that it seems Republicans are finally going to allow a clean vote on this so-called “fiscal cliff” bill that had passed the Senate. Leave it to their resident curmudgeon Charles Krauthammer to use the opportunity to paint President Obama as some evil Socialist who just wants to extract money from those hard-working rich people so that the lazy, good-for-nothing moochers out there can have their “entitlements.”

Never mind that he's completely wrong about President Obama being willing to negotiate with Republicans (far too often with the hostage taking we've witnessed), or that Republicans were the ones who originally voted to have these tax cuts expire. And never mind that we've got record income disparity and if we want to pay for a democratic society with a middle class, we should have a progressive tax code where the rich pay their share.

And of course no segment on Fox would be complete without some revisionist history in the form of St. Reagan worship.

BAIER: I mean, if you look at his deficit and debt commission, the Simpson-Bowles commission and the recommendations that came out of there (sorry Bret, but there were no recommendations from that commission, it failed) and what has not been followed through on, now two years ago, it's pretty remarkable.

KRAUTHAMMER: But he's not interested in that. And he's not interested in leading on spending. He's not interested in cutting spending. I think if you look at this in a large view, it's now becoming very clear who he is and what he wants to do. He's now in his second term. He's liberated.

He can be open about what he wants to do. He once said on '08 that Reagan was a historical President in a way that Clinton or Nixon was not. He meant Reagan changed the nature of the country. He got it hooked on low taxes, less government and an increase in inequality, is the way Obama sees it.

He sees his historical role, Obama, is to undo Reaganism and that means, not to cut spending. It means to raise taxes and he let the cat out of the bag on Monday. In that little rally he had, he said to Republicans, you're not getting any spending today and you know that, any spending cuts, but he said that if you think that you can get spending cuts after this in the rest of our negotiations, the answer is no. If you want a cut in spending, you're going to have to increase taxes on the rich.

Remember, he got an increase in revenues now by raising the rates on the rich. Well, now he's going to return, as he said on Monday and get increased revenue from the rich by eliminating deductions, the other way to do it. So he has no interest in anything other than raising the level of taxation, to sort of pre-Reagan levels, so he can support the entitlement state, which is what his presidency is all about. It's a very long view and I think he's attacking it in exactly the right way, if you were of his ideology.

Yeah, that's the ticket. The Kenyan usurper Socialist Communist just wants to beat up on the poor, oppressed rich people and steal all of their money for those lazy, undeserving seniors who would like their Social Security benefits so they don't starve. Krauthammer's still stuck in the '60's if he thinks this sort of talk is going to move most people when you still have so many people hurting from the recession and unemployed. That said, he knows he's speaking to the Fox viewers here, who are probably stuck right there with him.

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From ABC's This Week, GOP Representative and flamethrower Raul Labrador took a page out of Charles Krauthammer's book, and blamed the Democrats for the rifts within the Republican party and compared them to bank robbers while saying their plan is to raise taxes on everybody. Never mind that the party protecting the tax cuts for the ultra-rich at all costs is the Republicans.

Of course when host Jonathan Karl pointed out that the Republicans haven't been willing to compromise on anything, Labrador disagreed and said he'd be perfectly willing to compromise... as long as it means the GOP getting everything they want, which is destroying our social safety nets.

KARL: So let's -- but I want to ask, Republicans seem to be incredibly divided on this issue of taxes. You wouldn't even support your leader. You wouldn't even support Speaker Boehner, a relatively modest increase of those making over $1 million.

Charles Krauthammer said that this is -- Republicans are basically completely divided on this. Here's what he said: President Obama's been using this -- and I must say with great skill and ruthless skill and success -- to fracture and basically shatter the Republican opposition. His objective from the very beginning was to break the will of Republicans in the House and to create an internal civil war, and he has done that.

Is that what we are seeing here, is an internal civil war...

LABRADOR: Absolutely.

KARL: ... in the House?

LABRADOR: And I agree with Charles. This -- this has been what the Democrats wanted to do from day one. They have tried to divide the Republicans. They have tried to get us to fight against each other on taxes when -- I'm not really sure that they don't want to go over the fiscal cliff.

You're going to have Howard Dean here a little bit later. He agrees with many Democrats that what -- what they need is actually more revenue. They want to expand the growth of government. They need more revenues. You know, Democrats are like bank robbers. You don't have the money in the 2 percent -- the money is in the 100 percent. They want to raise taxes on everyone.

(CROSSTALK)

KARL: But you're unwilling...

(CROSSTALK)

KARL: ... you're unwilling to compromise at all.

LABRADOR: I'm willing to compromise if we have real cuts.

KARL: Not on taxes.

LABRADOR: No, if we have real cuts -- because what happens in Washington is that we talk about raising taxes today and then we talk about cuts 10 years from now. It happened under Reagan, it happened under Bush, and it's what's going to happen to us once again.

h/t Mediaite

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It's getting down to the wire, but President Obama is still pushing Congress to some to some sort of agreement ahead of this so-called "fiscal cliff." After meeting, Obama urges leaders to take 'immediate action' :

President Obama said Friday he was "modestly optimistic that an agreement can be achieved" to avoid the so-called "fiscal cliff," but warned congressional leaders he would demand an "up or down vote" on a Democratic Senate bill if a bipartisan agreement could not be reached in a timely fashion.

"We had a constructive meeting today," Obama said. "Sens. Reid and McConnell are discussing a potential agreement."

The president's remarks came shortly after a meeting with congressional leaders, Vice President Biden and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in the Oval Office.

But the president also warned that if the leaders were unable to strike an agreement, he would push for an up-and-down vote on a proposal that would increase taxes on those making more than $250,000 annually, and extend unemployment insurance.

"If we don't see an agreement between the two leaders in the Senate, I expect a bill to go on the floor ... that makes sure taxes on middle-class families don't go up," Obama said.

The president said he believed such a plan "could pass both houses with bipartisan majorities, as long as these leaders allow it to come to a vote."

Blasting the negotiations as "déjà vu all over again," Obama also chastised congressional leaders for waiting until the last minute to strike a deal. Read on...

Here's more from Greg Sargent: Obama to GOP: Last chance:

Obama is demanding that Mitch McConnell allow a straight up-or-down vote on Harry Reid’s fallback proposal, if the two sides cannot reach a deal. If no deal is reached, Obama is daring McConnell to filibuster a continued tax cut for the middle class and daring Boehner not to hold a vote on it.

A senior Senate Dem aide tells me that the fallback proposal Reid is working on would extend tax cuts on income just up to $250,000, not up to $400,000, as Obama’s most recent compromise proposal did. What this means is that if Senate Republican leaders fail to agree with Senate Dems on a proposal, the fallback plan Reid will offer will essentially rescind Obama’s offer to raise the income threshold to $400,000.

It’s possible, as many commentators are speculating, that today’s machinations mean Reid and McConnell really may reach a deal. But if not, by daring Republicans one last time to refuse to allow simple majority votes on extending the middle class tax cuts, Obama is signaling that if we do go over the cliff, he intends to extract maximum political pain for it.

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Before the election, Rep. Kevin McCarthy said that electing Mitt Romney would mean that Republicans have a mandate to overhaul Medicare: House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy: Election is ‘Mandate’ to Overhaul Medicare:

House Republican Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) says electing Mitt Romney this fall means Republicans have a ‘mandate’ to overhaul Medicare. As McCarthy put it, “If there’s a mandate going through this election, it’s to save Medicare.” As I put it: When Republicans say “save Medicare” they mean end Medicare as we know it. They would keep a government program called Medicare but it would not be the Medicare that has existed for almost half a century. The Republican plan for Medicare is to turn it into a program designed to shortchange seniors while increasing profits for private insurance companies.

We have a single payer health care insurance program that works very well for senior citizens. We don’t need to hand Medicare over to private insurance. Republicans can continue to blame Democrats for doing nothing to “save Medicare” but Republicans are the “kill Medicare” party and they have been for decades.

If what he said on this Sunday's Meet the Press is any indication, McCarthy hasn't seemed to figure out that they lost. And we've already explained here why this trial balloon put out there by the administration, where it seems they've forgotten who won as well, is a really bad idea that needs to be pushed back against forcefully. As everyone explained, even partially privatizing Medicare is not going to "save" the program. It just makes the cost of health care coverage more expensive for seniors.

I was glad to see Sen. Dick Durbin say raising the age is off the table during this interview, but I wasn't thrilled about him offering up means testing. Digby has more on that here: Hot Air Trial Ballooning:

I have a sneaking feeling that Durbin is throwing up a smokescreen there (or he's been smoking some of that special Alan Simpson sensimilla.) He must know that the argument is that Obamacare will pick up the slack if they decide to raise the Medicare age. If he doesn't then he needs to find another line of work.

Even Mitt Romney's health care advisor, Avik Roy from the Manhattan Institute, knows that. Here's what he said on Up with Chris Hayes this morning (with Steve Kornacki subbing for Chris)

"I have to respond to this interesting hyperbole about Medicare death sentence. If you raise the retirement age for Medicare, we have the Affordable Care Act as the backstop. Everybody under 400% poverty level is still covered with the affordable care act in place. So what we are really talking about is means testing Medicare by raising the retirement age. People who are upper income, above 400% of the poverty level won't be subsidized if they're younger retirees. It's where entitlement reform should go, to expand it into the retiree population."

(Kornacki pointed out that ACA is being challenged so it's not exactly a backstop at this point, but he let the topic drop in favor of more masturbation over tax rates.)

It sounds as if Roy and Jonathan Chait may have found the bipartisan sweet spot for Obamacare. Privatize Medicare! Now that really is a Grand Bargain.

Before everyone gets into another tizzy about how shrill and unreasonable I'm being for taking this rumor seriously, let's have a little discussion of what a "trial balloon" is. It is, simply, a rumor that's purposefully spread during a negotiation in order to gauge the reaction. Therefore, it is important to react, not act all glib and self-assured that it could never happen. They want to know if you think this is a good idea, so if you don't you should say so. And you should say it in a shrill enough fashion that they know it's a very big deal, if you think it's a very big deal.

Transcript below the fold.

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I'm not sure why anyone thinks Newt Gingrich has anything of value to offer with his presence on these Sunday talk shows, but if they're going to have him on, I'd like to see something like this happen more often: Lawrence O’Donnell Confronts Gingrich: Asks Him To Apologize For Predicting Clinton Tax Increases Would Lead To Downturn:

On Sunday, during an appearance on Meet The Press, MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell confronted Newt Gingrich for falsely predicting in 1993 that the economy would suffer if then-President Bill Clinton raised marginal tax rates.

Republican are making a similar argument against President Obama’s call to raise marginal tax rates on the richest Americans, even though the economy and jobs grew exponentially during the Clinton years when the top marginal tax rate was at 39.6 percent for the top income earners.

O’Donnell read off Gingrich’s false prediction and asked him to apologize to Americans: [...]

Indeed, in 1993 when President Bill Clinton raised taxes on the top income earners, Gingrich and the Republicans argued that the hikes would result in economic decline and result in huge deficits. They were proven wrong. The country experienced the “longest period of economic growth in U.S. history, increased business investment, 23 million jobs added, and, of course, budget surpluses.” The same boom did not materialize after President George W. Bush enacted his tax cuts; the country experienced large deficits and the weakest job and income growth in the post-war era.

Of course Gingrich wasn't going to let a few facts get in the way of his talking points.

Transcript below the fold.

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Saturday Night Live opened this weekend's show with Jay Pharoah returning as President Barack Obama, holding a mock press conference with Bill Hader as House Speaker John Boehner. After finding out how terribly the Speaker was being abused by his own party, SNL's Obama took pity on him and agreed to give him everything he wanted on the so-called "fiscal cliff" negotiations.

Let's just hope that any of this parody doesn't end up coming close to where this talk of a "grand bargain" ends up in real life.

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I would just like to remind CBS' John Dickerson of one thing. That "pound of flesh" he's talking about Republicans wanting to take from President Obama before they'd ever agree to increasing tax rates, is not actually coming from the President. It's coming from average working class Americans and seniors.

It would be nice to see the debate framed that way on these Sunday shows, when these pundits are casually discussing what pain Republicans would like to inflict on our population, rather than this just being some political game. I don't expect we'll see that happen any time soon though.

SCHIEFFER: Well, some people are actually saying maybe -- I'm hearing some liberal Democrats say let it go over the cliff. I mean, would they really do that? I mean, because what would happen, then you would have, I guess, the tax cuts would expire, but would they let these draconian cuts in, say, defense spending, where basically, the military wouldn't be able to buy gasoline for their vehicles and that kind of thing.

FOROOHAR: I think it's a dangerous argument. Now, I think the truth is if you go over the cliff for a couple weeks, no, that's not going to be a disaster to the economy if there's a deal in place, if a deal gets done quickly. But if you're on the cliff, off the cliff, and back on for weeks or months end that would have a really devastating effect not only on the economy but trust in our political system. And it's worth noting a recent Harvard Business School survey found most business leaders in this country see political dysfunction as the biggest impediment to growth.

SCHIEFFER: John.

DICKERSON: We used to walk up to the brink, now we basically live at the brink. All of this is the fourth or fifth round of negotiations of these budgets. And if you think about the politics of this, what is being debated is not just the central issues of taxes and spending that are key to both parties, but you have a president enjoying an election that he just won. He is doing well in the polls. The Pew Foundation put out a poll and said basically 53 percent of people would blame Republicans if we go over the cliff, only 29 percent would blame the president. CNN, 45 Republicans, 34 the president. He's feeling good about his political position.

You have got Republicans trying to figure out their new place in the world. And you have these various serious issues at stake. Basically, the thing to keep the eye on the ball here is the president wants Republicans to agree to increase rates. In 2010, Republicans were brought to office by anti-tax activists in the Tea Party. Their number one issue -- don't raise rates. So the president is asking them to do something right at the heart of their party. Two-thirds of the Republicans who were re-elected, were re-elected with big majorities, 60 percent. It's OK with their constituents if we go over the cliff because they're standing on principle. So how are they going to get the Republicans.

How is the president going to get Republicans to increase rates? He's going to have to do something on entitlements that allows those Republicans to say, hey, we -- sure, we agreed to increasing rates, but look at the pound of flesh we got from the president. The problem, is the president thinks he did well in this election. He thinks the country is behind him. He's not into giving a pound of flesh. They'll give something on entitlements, but so far it's not big enough to give Republicans what they need to get the vote here which is why we may go over the cliff.

And it's not just liberal Republicans -- Newt Gingrich, no liberal he, saying that the fiscal cliff is all - it's just a charade. It's something liberals are trying to do to get Republicans to agree to tax increases.