Poll: Americans prefer spending cuts to tax hikes

A new poll from AP-GfK reveals that while Americans like the idea of the wealthy pitching a little more of their lucre into the pot used to pay for government, they much prefer cutting spending – and services – to additional tax hikes. The AP said its poll revealed that 2 in 3 respondents like Barack Obama’s plan to demand people making $1 million or more to pay more – taxes equal to 30 percent of their income. Ads by Google Web CollageFree Evaluation of Your Experience Distance Education in 15 Days PanworldUniversity.com But the poll said by a 56 percent to 31 percent margin, respondents liked the idea of cutting government services, and taxes, better than having higher taxes. The poll was conducted Feb. 16-20. AP writer Alan Fram concluded that gives Republicans “an edge” over Democrats in their core ideological dispute over the nation’s money woes. “Everybody should be called to sacrifice. They should be in the pot with the rest of us,” Mike Whittles, 62, a Republican, told Fram. Whittles is a retired policeman from Point Pleasant, N.J., and said he was referencing Obama’s tax hike plan for the rich. Join the campaign to let members of Congress know it’s time to just stop the borrowing. But he said he prefers cutting government spending to raising more revenue. AP also reported its poll showed 54 percent of the respondents gave Democrats favorable ratings, and 46 percent gave Republicans favorable ratings. The AP noted Obama’s plan to tax millionaires more “has virtually no chance of passage by Congress.” The report also said, “Republicans have an 8 percentage point advantage over Democrats in the public’s trust for handling budget deficits, essentially unchanged in recent months. The GOP has the same edge for protecting the country, an issue it usually dominates. Peoples’ trust in the two parties is about even for handling the economy, taxes and job creation.” That’s even though Obama for the first two years of his reign had a Democrat-controlled Congress and should have been able to move forward with any economic solution he chose. The GOP has been in control of the House for only the last year. AP said its poll was done by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Corporate Communications through phone interviews with 1,000 randomly chosen adults. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points. WND has reported on several groups that are forecasting an economic doomsday – with the nation’s skyrocketing debt – it has grown some $5 trillion under Obama – to reach the nation’s borrowing limit something around election time this fall. Among those making the forecast are the Bipartisan Policy Center, Obama’s own 2013 budget, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and others. The debt ceiling is set at $16.394 trillion. Last year, the ceiling was raised after a bitter battle that included a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating, a first. But officials said then their solution would last into 2013. That forecast now has changed. Reported Politico, “If the United States maxes out its credit limit before the end of this year, that could set up another messy and acrimonious battle during the lame-duck session. Lawmakers already face a dilemma over expiring Bush-era tax rates and a potential fight over preventing the $1.2 trillion in automatic budget cuts that were borne out of the supercommittee’s failure last November. “Congress has to sign off on any increases to the debt ceiling, but the Treasury Department can employ a variety of accounting maneuvers to stall the absolute deadline before the country defaults on its debt. It did so last year, when the debt limit was actually hit in May but Treasury was able to delay the deadline until early August,” the analysis said. Another alternative to a raging battle over the debt ceiling would be the “No More Red Ink” campaign. That updated and expanded campaign created by WND founder Joseph Farah simply would have majority Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives decline to authorize any further borrowing. The move would be expected to force immediate and sudden budget cuts that would result in the federal government living within its income. That idea gets significant approval from Americans. According to the results of a recent Wenzel Strategies poll for WND, two out of three voters across the political spectrum say they are more likely to support a presidential or congressional candidate who promises to freeze the debt limit and stop borrowing more money; that is, simply stop the nation’s red ink. The stunning results come as all major GOP candidates have at some point addressed the profligate spending by Obama, under whose direction the U.S. national debt has increased more than under any other president, or century of presidents. The poll was conducted by telephone for WND Feb. 1-3. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.44 percentage points. More than 48 percent of respondents, including 29 percent of the Democrats and nearly 65 percent of the Republicans, said they were much more likely to support a candidate who wants to freeze the debt and stop borrowing. Another 19 percent said they were somewhat more likely. The dramatic impact of a freeze, because of the demands Obama’s programs have put on the budget, likely could create the need to close down entire federal bureaucracies. On the other side of the fence, only 20 percent of the respondents said they were less likely to support such a candidate. Fritz Wenzel, whose organization does the polling for WND, said, “Overwhelming majorities of Americans believe there should be firm restrictions placed on the federal government’s ability to borrow to force Washington to spend less money, even if that means massive cutbacks in federal agencies. They also will vote overwhelmingly for candidates for president and congressional offices who promised to impose such cuts on the national government.” He continued, “Whether it is the continuing weak economy, their own pressing personal debt problems, or reports of the social unrest that out-of-control government spending in Europe has caused over there, Americans appear to have finally realized that we as a nation can no longer afford a federal government that spends trillions more than it takes in. The idea that we would never have to really face consequences for deficit spending has finally been dispelled, and people are now expressing concern that their very way of life – and especially the future prosperity of their children – will be adversely affected by what politicians in Washington are doing today.”