Once again, Republicans blew another opportunity to speak directly to voters.  This time, it happened in response to the president's new budget proposal.  "The president is advocating more spending, more taxes, and more debt," Speaker Boehner droned on, yet again.  "A proposal that never balances is not a serious plan for America's fiscal future."    Senator majority leader McConnell didn't do much better when he characterized the budget as "another tired, tax-and-spend manifesto [that] focuses on growing the bureaucracy instead of opportunity. It does not balance – ever. And because it is not designed to pass Congress, of course it doesn't." While both men speak the truth, "tax and spend" has become such a commonplace clarion call of conservatives that no one pays attention to it anymore – certainly not when the opposition is talking about you and me, our college tuition, the roads...(Read Full Post)