So, pay the vig.  That’s the extortion Senator Patty Murray (D, WA) is threatening us with.  Roll over, and give us our tax increase on those we don’t like, or we’ll raise taxes on everyone.

[If] we can’t get a good deal, a balanced deal that calls on the wealthy to pay their fair share, then I will absolutely continue this debate into 2013…. We will have a new fiscal and political reality….

Of course, she continues to insist that “fair” is whatever the Progressives say it is, at any moment.  She, like her fellows, have continuously refused to say what amount constitutes a “fair share,” for her hated rich or for her sainted poor.

Here’s her naked extortion threat:

If middle-class families start seeing more money coming out of their paychecks next year—are Republicans really going to stand up and fight for new tax cuts for the rich? Are they going to continue opposing the Democrats’ middle-class tax cut once the slate has been wiped clean?

She’s also taking our national defense hostage and demanding that it be ransomed with more taxes.  The article at the link cites her as adding

[If] Republicans don’t negotiate to her party’s liking on the automatic spending cuts—known in Washington as the “sequestration”—set to take effect at the start of next year, her party would let those cuts happen, too.

Can we afford four more years of this assault on our freedoms?  Can we afford four more years of bipartisanship meaning “do it the Progressive way, or else?”

As to the taxes themselves, to which Senator Murray and her fellows are so tightly bound, Murray and her fellows, as with so much of the legislation they’ve rammed through, are running against the wishes of Americans.   The latest McClatchy-Marist poll has found the following:

• Registered voters want all of the tax cuts extended, including for those with incomes above $250,000, by 52% to 43% wanting the cuts reserved for those making $250,000 or less
• Those making less than $50,000 per year supported tax cuts for all incomes by 53% to 41%
• Voters in the age band 18-29 favor tax cuts for everyone by 69% to 29%