However, when Mitt Romney is paying a third the effective rate of most everybody else, that’s clearly not the situation we’re in.

Waaqaaaahhhhhh!! Mitt Romney has more than me!!!!!!!! Daddy take his candy away from him!!!!!!!

Now hush Levi, the adults are talking.

Levi’s already documented his depth of incoherence when he simultaneously claimed that “Big Deficits Are Good in a Recession” but we absolutely must tax the productive to reduce the deficit.</blockq

Deficits are never good. Sometimes deficits are necessary. Recessions like this one are when deficits are necessary. It is good to run a deficit in a recession because it helps you get out of the recession, not simply because deficits are good.

And because deficits are never good, you try to avoid them as much as possible. But, if you're in a recession, and you are running a deficit to get out of the recession, then that deficit ought to be minimized. In our current situation, when rich people are richer than they've ever been and paying their lowest rates in decades, raising taxes on the rich is a suitable way of minimizing the deficit. Certainly, there are scenarios where the rich could be paying too much or just the right amount of taxes, and you would have to find ways to minimize deficits elsewhere. However, when Mitt Romney is paying a third the effective rate of most everybody else, that's clearly not the situation we're in.

http://reason.com/archives/2012/12/01/if-you-dont-think-spending-is-at-the-roo/singlepage