The Democrats in Washington need to be doing more, and more, and more of this.  They're supposed to uphold Democratic Party values: the common good and general welfare of all, government of, by, and for all not just the few.

From the Washington Post:  "President Obama and Democratic leaders in Congress are setting the stage for a high-stakes battle over taxes in the final weeks before the November congressional elections, betting that their plan to eliminate tax breaks for the wealthy will resonate with voters who have lost houses and jobs to what many see as an era of Wall Street greed.

"Democrats, facing the potential loss of their majorities on Capitol Hill, believe that the strategy will both force Republicans to defend tax breaks for a tiny, wealthy minority and expose GOP hypocrisy on budget deficits.

"Although they have blamed Democrats for record budget deficits, most Republican lawmakers want to extend all of the tax cuts, adding at least $2 trillion over the next decade to the national debt. President Obama and senior Democrats want to extend the cuts only for families making less than $250,000 a year."

As Howie Klein at Down With Tyranny reminds us: "Time for the tax burden to be more fairly distributed----and come off the backs of working people.....

"In 2008, victorious Democrats running for the House, for the Senate and for President drew a clear, sharp line in the sand: Republicans stand for tax cuts for the wealthy; Democrats stand for making the rich pay their fair share of taxes in order to shift the burden off the backs of the middle class. It was an inspiring and winning formula across the country. They all focused specifically on the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, campaigning on abolishing them while Republicans promised to extend them.

"So to have heard that some Democrats were getting cold feet about making the rich pay their fair share seemed like political suicide for Democrats."

He offers this example of Democrats maintaining their common good party principles while the Repuglicans try to keep the wealthy few even richer at the unfair expense of regular people.

"....reactionary South Carolina handmaiden for the wealthy and rabble-rouser for imbeciles, Jim DeMint, demagoguing against the Estate tax, while Bernie Sanders explains that the Estate tax is an attempt to "provide one trillion dollars in tax breaks to the top three-tenths of one percent. 99.7% of the American people do not get a nickel. In the end DeMint's amendment was defeated 39-59
with only the two most reactionary Democrats voting with the GOP, habitual aisle crossers and asskissers to wealthy donors, Blanche Lincoln (AR) and Ben Nelson (NE)."

Letting Bush's tax breaks for the wealthy expire is a no-brainer. No real Democrat should act other than to eliminate this unfair tax break for the rich or that person is not a Democrat.