Reader’s view: Cravaack isn’t first to regret anti-tax pledge

U.S. Rep. Chip Cravaack is not the first Republican politician to have buyer’s remorse over signing Grover Norquist’s pledge to never, ever raise taxes. Other Republican pledges, like Sen. Tom Coburn, have realized they made a mistake, too, and we can only hope that more of them also will come to that realization.

I believe most Americans understand that increasing taxes on the top 2 percent of income-earners is not enough by itself to attack the deficit in a meaningful way. Neither is just cutting spending. This is probably not the time to reduce federal spending, but at some point in the future we all will be paying more taxes, or enhancing the revenue of the government, as Ronald Reagan so slyly put it.

Glen Backman

Duluth

Tags: readers views, opinion, editorials, politics, money, minnesota