Democrats agree

President Barack Obama's plan to ostensibly spur job growth would do just the opposite.

He had announced a new $447 billion stimulus of new and temporary spending, then turned around to propose offsetting that spending with $1.5 trillion over 10 years in permanent tax hikes. He certainly knows this will not fly in the Republican-controlled House, but guess who else is opposed to these huge tax increases.

Democrats who control the Senate. Senators from energy-producing states object to targeting the oil and gas industry. Those include Mark Begich of Alaska and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana.

New York's Chuck Schumer, a liberal lion in the Senate, objects to allowing the Bush tax cuts on taxpayers earning more than $200,000 - $250,000 for married couples - expire. He notes that $250,000 does not make anybody rich in his high-cost state.

Nebraska's Ben Nelson says his constituents want spending cuts, not tax hikes. Tom Carper of Delaware favors a long-term deficit-reduction plan to spur new job creation.

The massive tax increases come ostensibly as part of the president's plan to reduce the nation's out-of-control debt, but rather than address the underlying spending problem, it will further deepen America's economic quagmire and only serves to stall the real reform America needs in order to get on a path of fiscal sanity.

Pundits on the right and left alike have correctly noted that the president's proposals amount to the opening round of his re-election campaign. We'll see how the American people judge the direction he's headed when they vote in next year's presidential election.

- The Chieftain, Pueblo, Colo.