Obama Appeals to Business for Support on Tax Plan

[WestVirginiaRebel]

NY Times:

WASHINGTON — After a campaign that drove a deep wedge between them, President Obama is now trying to rebuild relations with the business community in hopes of enlisting it in his showdown with Through phone calls, White House invitations and old-fashioned political flattery, Mr. Obama has dispensed with some of the populist language of the campaign trail to appeal to corporate America’s palpable desire for certainty. In groups and one by one, the president is making a case to business leaders that siding with him will put the nation back on a firm fiscal footing and unleash the economy.

“What’s holding us back right now, ironically, is a lot of stuff that’s going on in this town,” Mr. Obama told the Business Roundtable, a group of corporate leaders, on Wednesday. “And I know that many of you have come down here to try to see, is there a way that we can break through the logjam and go ahead and get things done? And I’m here to tell you that nobody wants to get this done more than me.”

White House officials have been encouraged by what they describe as a more positive reaction than expected. Many chief executives who met with Mr. Obama privately at the White House last week told him they would go along with his proposal to raise taxes on the wealthy. And several have come out publicly for the plan as long as there is also an effort to tame the growth of entitlement spending.

Frederick W. Smith, the chief executive of FedEx and a supporter of Mitt Romney’s, said it was “a lot of mythology” that “you’ll kill jobs” by raising tax rates on the wealthy. Lloyd C. Blankfein, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, called Mr. Obama’s deficit reduction plans “very credible” and said that he “wouldn’t preclude” higher tax rates on higher income. Randall Stephenson, the chief executive of AT&T and another Romney supporter, called for “a compromise involving an increase in both tax rates” and “significant steps to reform entitlements and rein in federal spending.”

The White House hopes such statements help crack Republican solidarity.

“There are a lot of people in there who support the Republican Congress, who were ‘super PAC’ donors to Mitt Romney, yet they want a solution here,” David Plouffe, the president’s senior adviser, said after the Business Roundtable visit. “A lot of them have special influence in the Republican Party, and if they’re telling Republican leaders and members that they have to compromise, that’s going to have a real effect.”

Still, plenty of business leaders oppose Mr. Obama’s plans, and Republicans countered Wednesday by releasing comments from small-business owners saying that higher tax rates would stifle their firms. And even those who have signaled support for Mr. Obama’s stance on taxes are also pressing Democrats to rein in spending.

During a closed question session after Mr. Obama’s speech Wednesday, Kenneth I. Chenault, chief executive of American Express, emphasized that entitlement overhaul was necessary to address long-term deficits, along with tax increases and other spending cuts, according to a chief executive in the room.

Republicans in Congress over the looming fiscal crisis.

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Obama tries to claim that his tax plan will help businesses.

[SrWoodchuck]

Santa? Is that you....Santa?

H/T:TheoSpark

 

 

You too, Obumbler......

[Argyle58]

I'm sure that these folks are getting the same promises of spending cuts and government reform that Congress is getting. If the Democrats could show just ONE instance in the past 60 years that they've kept a promise of spending cuts and government reform, they would probably get a lot more support.