Peggy Noonan Supports the Party Line on Tax Cuts – Strains Mightily to Sell Them

And Fails Because of Logic, Facts and Data

Every now and then Peggy Noonan writes something makes sense in the WSJ. When she does we imagine the powers that be call her into the office and say no, don't do that again. You have to toe the party line. And so she does in her musings on the tax bill.

Like other hard line Republicans she thinks it will do good and she chastises the Dems for not supporting, telling them they will rue the day (just like they did in Alabama perhaps).

And the bill is going to prove popular. The Democrats bet wrong on this. Almost immediately on passage, Wells Fargo and Fifth Third Bancorp announced a raise in their lowest wage to $15 an hour. AT&T said it would give about 200,000 unionized workers a $1,000 bonus and increase capital spending $1 billion. Comcast said it would give 100,000 employees bonuses and spend more than $50 billion in infrastructure improvement.

Gosh, a few corporations that need regulatory favors from Trumpie dole out a few crumbs. Conservatives like Noonan think those who recognize the pittance are looking down on the recipients, but in fact it is Noonan and her ilk that are condescending to working families. They think those families are fools, idiots who can be bought with a few pieces of silver. Sorry Peg, they are smarter than that.

The corporations that announce investments would have invested anyway. They just want to get some mileage out of fooling Trump, and it's just so easy to do. As for the provisions, notice this

 But it is good to cut the corporate rate from an absurd and uncompetitive 35% to a more constructive 21%; it is compassionate to double the child tax credit; it is fair to cut taxes for small businesses, many of which are struggling.

Like every other Republican apologist Noonan leaves out things like the elimination of the personal exemptions, or the fact that child tax credits expire when the child is a senior in high school which is just when their costs to their parents start to skyrocket. Impact on the deficit and national debt? Nowhere to be found in the unbridled praise.

As for Noonan there is this.

As a salaried worker in a high-tax state, I am about to get clobbered with the loss of the state and local tax deduction.

Oh, poor poor Peggy. But wait, no, she is getting a big drop in rates. And you know, probably in her future is Peggy Noonan LLC, a pass through that will get to exclude 20% of her income from any taxation. Why can't these people just tell the truth.