Resolve the 'Fiscal Cliff'

The President and Congress have failed to lead us on the issue of the 'fiscal cliff.' This petition calls on the members of the Republican Governors Association--people like Chris Christie, Scott Walker, and Mitch Daniels--to lead us through this crisis by taking up their podiums, making the case for low taxes, and calling on Congress and the President to serve their people:

If the President gets his way, then people in all 50 states, including small business owners and other job creators will be hit by higher taxes. His supposed justification is 'fairness' and revenue. 

But the justification of the proposed tax increase is faulty and contrary to common sense. A higher tax rate on higher-income Americans does not constitute 'fairness,' and we know from the experience of the last century that it is lowering, not raising, tax rates that has increased revenue. We saw this under Coolidge in the 1920's, Kennedy in the 1960's, Reagan in the 1980's and Bush in the 2000's.

Furthermore, since Republicans support lower tax rates and Democrats want to increase revenues, the obvious compromise should be to lower tax rates—all tax rates—to the level that maximizes revenues. As it stands, the country is being subverted by the myth that higher tax rates necessarily lead to higher tax revenues, and that it is Republicans, not Democrats, who are impeding progress and resolution.

Before the American people choose Republicans to lead them again, Republicans will need to demonstrate that they can lead—that the election loss has not so disheartened them that they have resorted to being sad losers for the next four years. And that is why we need leaders, great communicators, to take up their podiums and address the American people now like Reagan did in 1964.

This is a chance for out great state leaders to show that they can unify the country behind common sense, even on a divisive issue—show that our problems cross party lines and that we can fix them without betraying our common principles: that people should be able to keep what they earn, that tax rates should not be used for purposes of punishment or populism, that we should be governed by facts and not by the failed ideas of big-government nor by arbitrary, tyrannical control, and that Americans still want what they have always wanted—the maximum amount of freedom and prosperity consistent with law and order. This is a chance for the Republican Governors to prove now that they will be up to the task of leading in 2016.

Republican Governors, we call on you to serve the people of your States and help lead us through this impasse.