For GOPers, deficit doesn't matter when it comes to tax cuts for the wealthiest

Remember how Republicans wouldn't support extending unemployment benefits for those Americans who were bearing the brunt of the economic crisis created by GOP policies? Remember how worried they were about the deficits? Well, the GOP's plan to extend all of the Bush tax cuts would add billions to the deficit -- and only benefit the very rich. I doubt we'll hear many concerns about budget busting from the GOPers on this one. No surprise, but, they're hypocrites:

A Republican plan to extend tax cuts for the rich would add more than $36 billion to the federal deficit next year -- and transfer the bulk of that cash into the pockets of the nation's millionaires, according to a congressional analysis released Wednesday.

New data from the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation show that households earning more than $1 million a year would reap nearly $31 billion in tax breaks under the GOP plan in 2011, for an average tax cut per household of about $100,000.

The analysis, requested by Democrats on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, comes as debate heats up over tax cuts enacted during the Bush administration, most of which are scheduled to expire at the end of this year. Republicans want to extend all the cuts, which would cost the Treasury Department $238 billion in 2011, according to the taxation committee. President Obama and congressional Democrats have vowed to extend the cuts only for families making less than $250,000 a year and individuals making less than $200,000 -- 98 percent of American taxpayers -- in a plan that would add about $202 billion to next year's deficit.

Given the soaring national debt, many economists deem both proposals unaffordable. Even some Republicans, including Reagan administration budget chief David Stockman and former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan, have urged lawmakers to let them expire and allow income tax rates to pop back up to their levels during the Clinton administration.

Why do I have a sinking feeling that somehow, at the end of the Congressional session, the GOPers are going to win this debate. They just have to sit back and wait for the White House and the likes of Max Baucus to cave. They usually do.