"Class Warfare" Edition

Republican politicians and right-wing pundits are attacking the President's "Buffett Rule" proposal. Here's a guide to fighting back against the "class warfare" talking points they've used for years.

CORE MESSAGE

KEY POINTS

• We cannot pay our country's debts without asking millionaires to pay their share. That's not class warfare - it's math. 

• Middle-class families shouldn't pay higher taxes than millionaires. That's not class warfare - that's a basic American value. 

• As Warren Buffett tells it, the only "class warfare" in America is being waged by his class - and they're winning.

Connect: It's no accident our middle class is shrinking. Millionaires, corporations, and their lobbyists get all kinds of favors, but the middle class gets left behind.

Expose: It's the middle class that's under attack now, not the super-rich or giant corporations. Republican politicians only complain about "class warfare" when the middle class fights back.

Define: The Buffett Rule is simple: Middle class families shouldn't pay higher taxes than millionaires.

Explain: More millionaire tax giveaways mean less money for middle-class jobs. That's just math.

Core values: America was founded as a country where we reward hard work more than how much money anyone's family has. We should keep it that way.

Tweet: Warren Buffett: "There's class warfare...but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning" #classwarfare

Tweet: Decoding GOP speak: class warfare=protecting tax giveaways for millionaires & big corps instead of middle class jobs. Americans pick jobs.

Tweet: Cut Medicare, job training & student loans: "fiscal responsibility" Billionaires paying same tax rate as working Americans: #classwarfare

QUOTE TO REMEMBER

"There's class warfare, all right. But it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning."

- Warren Buffet

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

• The super-rich can afford to pay more in taxes. The richest 400 Americans have more wealth than half of all Americans combined and also pay a smaller share of their income in taxes than average Americans like their secretaries.
• 27 major national polls show that Americans believe we need to raise taxes, including a new poll that shows 70 percent support ending wasteful tax giveaways to corporations and millionaires.
• Instead of passing a payroll tax cut for working Americans, Republicans are trying to give more wasteful tax breaks to millionaires and big corporations.
• Corporations are paying lower taxes than ever, raking in all-time high profits, and hoarding record piles of cash.
• We've tried "trickle down" and it didn't work. Corporate tax giveaways don't create jobs, and more of the Bush tax giveaways to millionaires won't create jobs either.
• While Republican politicians fight to protect millionaire tax giveaways, just this year alone, they've been fighting to: 
  • Eliminate nearly 7 million jobs - and now they're opposing the President's plan to put millions of Americans back to work.
  • End Medicare as we know it by turning it into a voucher system that will double health care costs for seniors;
  • Cut K-12 education, job training, and Pell grants that help kids go to college, at a time when the competition has never been tougher;
  • Give over $4 trillion in new tax breaks for millionaires and corporate special interests and protect $40 billion in giveaways to Big Oil.
  • Take health insurance away from 32 million Americans.

We develop messaging by aggregating, analyzing and distilling polling, tested messaging, and expert recommendations, and monitoring the media to identify what is and isn't working. See here for some of the experts and organizations we draw on.