Super Committee

As Super Committee Gridlocks, Influential Conservatives Harden Their No-Tax Demands

Brian Beutler | October 27, 2011, 6:00AM

Surprise! The deficit Super Committee is gridlocked! Because Republicans don't want to raise taxes revenues at all.

And with less than a month to go before the Committee's statutory deadline, the GOP's leading lights and the stars of the conservative movement aren't relenting one bit, leaving the panel's Republicans little room to maneuver.

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Haley Barbour

Flat Tax-Mentum! Barbour Backs Flat Tax, Privatized Social Security

Brian Beutler | October 25, 2011, 11:21AM

Haley Barbour (R)

The flat tax is becoming a litmus test for Republican presidential candidates, and on Tuesday it won a key endorsement from the former chairman of the Republican Governors Association.

At an event sponsored by the American Action Forum, at the National Press Club in Washington, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour argued in favor of key elements of Rick Perry's freshly released budget plan, which includes the option of a single income and corporate tax rate, unspecified spending cuts, a spending cap, and private savings accounts for workers as an alternative to Social Security.

"Is a flat tax good tax policy? Yes. It's not the only good tax policy. But it's certainly can be very good tax policy, particularly if you eliminate a lot of deductions so that it increases the appropriate amount of revenue," Barbour said.

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