Here is what is being discussed as a solution to the "fiscal cliff." Too bad no one has bothered to honor fiscal conservatives in the current negotiations.

Update #2 - over night,  the Senate passed the "fiscal cliff bill,"  89 to 8.  First reports have the House considering the bill after Boehner and company have a chance to read the proposition.  The bill "postpones" spending cuts,  which is code  for "there will never be any meaningful tax cuts if we Progressives have a say in the matter.  

Update:  no deal before the 1st.  Seriously,  this is no big deal.  Remember all that disaster talk,  last year,  surrounding the debt ceiling?  The world was going to end come August of 2011.  Well,  as it turns out,  we crossed the debt ceiling barrier the previous May  --  three months earlier;  "they" just forgot to tell anyone.    Ditto here.  A lot of talk or,  in the words of a coke user (Obama while in school),  just a lot of blow.

Fox News/Midknight Review:    As of 12 pm,  Monday,  December 31, a "deal" would raise tax rates for individuals with income above $400,000 a year and households above $450,000 a year, according to source familiar with matter.  The deal would include a permanent alternative minimum tax fix,  keep the estate taxes at current levels,  write a “doctor’s fix” which would prevent an immediate 27% cut to doctors accepting Medicare and extend unemployment benefits for a year while postponing spending cuts. 

Understand that tax increases without spending cuts do nothing but give congress more money to spend  --  and that is the problem driving our nation into the dirt.  The Democrat  Party is clearly the party of “fiscal irresponsibility.”  I only wish that that could be said to the exclusion of the GOP,  but such is not the case . . . .  not even close.  Worse,  those in the Grand Old Party,  have busied themselves,  of late,  blaming the fiscal conservatives in the party,  for all of the GOP’s recent woes.  The ONLY voice of sanity on the Hill,  as relates to fiscal issues,  comes out of the grassroots movement that has been named “the teaparty.”  

While the teaparty has been infested with much distraction  (Santorum’s social agenda campaign,  for example),  we find - more than three years after its first 1.8 million man demonstration in Washington – that the central issues remain threefold:  1) a balanced budget, 2) a concern for the continuation of the Constitution, and 3) a return to personal responsibility and state's rights,  rather than the sucking sound of an out of control dependency on the Central Government.   

  

Will conservative House members defeat the approaching “deal”  being talked about  within the past hour?  

We will know by this evening.