For a minute there I thought the Administration might run out of reasons to raise taxes.

Those fun-loving cutups over at the International Monetary Fund are not usually in the position of lecturing their host and main benefactor but according to a report in the Washington Post:

THE UNITED STATES NEEDS TO REDUCE GOVERNMENT SPENDING (or raise taxes).

Or, if you are a Democrat,

THE UNITED STATES NEEDS TO (reduce government spending or) RAISE TAXES.

From the article:

"The level of the correction needed is large, perhaps 10 percent of gross domestic product. In the United States, that would amount to roughly $1.4 trillion annually, to be cut from government programs or raised through new taxes."

I can't help but feel as if complaining about another trillion in taxes would be like complaining about a paper cut on your right hand as your right arm is being severed at the shoulder.

No matter what, given that we are now living with the consequences of over half the voting population's 2008 drinking binge, higher taxes are coming. The higher taxes, especially combined with the taxes coming from last year's spending spree, will reduce personal discretionary spending, stalling the marketplace and pretty much completing the Eurofication of the USA. Better start dusting off my French (I refuse to learn Spanish and CW has German covered).

As an aside, I wonder if the word "trillion" is going to get its own star on the walk outside Grauman's Chinese Theater. It certainly has become famous over the past year and a half.