Republican and Conservative political analysis and commentary

George Will notes something curious about the Democratic presidential field: They aren't talking much about the economy. There's a reason for that: the economy, thanks to the Bush tax cuts, is healthy. Very, very healthy Since the Bush tax cuts kicked in, in 2002, the economy began 65 months, generating jobs, shrinking unemployment and creating new wealth.

And yet...

Twenty-three months after the next president is inaugurated, the Bush tax cuts expire. The winner of the 2008 election and her or his congressional allies will determine what is done about the fact that, unless action is taken, in 2011 the economy will be walloped:

The five income tax brackets (10, 25, 28, 33 and 35 percent) will be increased 50, 12, 10.7, 9.1 and 13.1 percent, respectively, to 15, 28, 31, 36 and 39.6 percent. The child tax credit reverts to $500 from $1,000. The estate tax rate, which falls to zero in 2009, will snap back to a 60 percent maximum, and exemptions that have increased will decrease. The capital gains rate will rise, and the marriage penalty will be revived, as will the double taxation of dividends.

Furthermore, the alternative minimum tax was enacted by Democratic moralists in 1969 because 21 millionaires had legally avoided paying any income tax. The AMT, which allows almost no deductions, had one rate (24 percent) until 1993, when Democrats replaced it with two (26 percent and 28 percent). It has never been indexed for inflation and in the current tax year will hit almost one in five households -- 23 million of them.

Democrats need not confine themselves to their ritual tropes about how "the middle class is under assault" (Clinton again). They control Congress; they can act. The unemployed John Edwards, who has the luxury of irresponsibility, challenges Democrats to repeal the Bush tax cuts they disapprove of rather than wait for them to expire.

While Democrats running for president are loathe to call for tax increases by pushing to repeal the Bush tax cuts now, Republicans running for president ough to be trumpeting the health of the economy and reminding voters that the only way to preserve the Bush tax cuts and the healthy economy is to put a Republican president in the White House. The Democratic Congress surely won't move to preserve the tax cuts.