Mark Dayton: “today, we are witnessing another display of Republican anguish for America's oppressed minority, the rich and the…”

“today, we are witnessing another display of Republican anguish for America's oppressed minority, the rich and the super-rich. They suffer from a terrible injustice: They have to pay taxes on their millions and multimillions and even billions of dollars in accumulated wealth. Thanks to my Republican colleagues, the rich and super-rich pay far less in taxes than they did 5 years ago. But their sympathy knows no bounds. So today we are debating eliminating taxes--not just lowering them but eliminating them--on only the wealthiest one-half of 1 percent of all Americans, taxes they don't even pay themselves but their estates pay after they die. This debate is not about saving family farms or small businesses, although I personally favor exempting them from all estate taxes. This proposal is about eliminating a tax that falls only on the rich and the super-rich. When it comes to tax cuts for them, the Republicans just cannot do enough. They have done so much already. They lowered the top personal income tax rates by more than any other categories. They reduced the tax rate for capital gains to 15 percent. President Bush wanted to eliminate taxes on dividends, but Congress settled on a 15 percent rate for that income as well.…”