President Obama traveled to Florida yesterday to distract the nation from its real problems by laying out his case for the Buffett Rule, a plan to drastically raise taxes on successful Americans and small businesses. The core of his argument is that the rich aren’t paying their fair share. It makes for great populist rhetoric, especially when families are hurting and angry under today’s high unemployment, but the result is terrible policy. Worse, it’s a distraction from the big issues facing the nation, like the deficit, the economy, jobs, gas prices, health care, and on and on, none of which are addressed by the President’s proposals, and none of which he wants to talk about.
