Obama 'agnostic' on middle class tax increase

During his presidential campaign Barack Obama made multiple pledges that individuals making less than $200,000 and households earning less than $250,000 would experience no tax increase under his administration:



His soaring, almost revival-like delivery made true believers out of millions of voters.  Now a year after taking the oath of office as President of the United States, at a time when the country needs leadership as never before, Obama declares himself  "agnostic:"

President Barack Obama said he is “agnostic” about raising taxes on households making less than $250,000 as part of a broad effort to rein in the budget deficit.

Obama, in a Feb. 9 Oval Office interview, said that a presidential commission on the budget needs to consider all options for reducing the deficit, including tax increases and cuts in spending on entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

“The whole point of it is to make sure that all ideas are on the table,” the president said in the interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, which will appear on newsstands Friday. “So what I want to do is to be completely agnostic, in terms of solutions.”

Obama repeatedly vowed during the 2008 presidential election campaign that he would not raise taxes on individuals making less than $200,000 and households earning less than $250,000 a year. When senior White House economic adviser Lawrence H. Summers and Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner suggested in August that the administration might be open to going back on that pledge, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs quickly reiterated the president’s promise.

In the interview, Obama said that putting preconditions on the agenda of a bipartisan advisory commission, which he said he would soon establish, would just undermine its purpose.

If only he were as agnostic on health care, cap and trade and card check.

Via Jim Geraghty.