Bloomberg Headline Says It All: Republicans Set Aside Middle-Income Tax Cuts to Focus on Rich

It is about time the truth gets out - the class war is on, but middle and working America have not been fighting. This is a war of knowledge, so read all the necessary numbers here.

Republican lawmakers, facing the prospect that their power to cut taxes may soon be curbed, plan to extend breaks that mostly benefit the wealthy and Wall Street at the expense of reductions for middle-income households.

Six months before elections that may return a Democratic majority in at least one house of Congress, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois are focusing on extending the 15 percent rate on investments and repealing the estate tax. They won't push extensions of lower rates for all taxpayers and expanded breaks for married couples and families with children, which expire after 2010.

Democrats say the Republicans are favoring tax breaks that do little for middle-income Americans; 50 percent of all U.S. households earn between $26,859 and $120,100, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan research institution in Washington.

``Even in an election year where they are losing popularity nationwide, they've chosen to pander to their base of rich donors and leave the middle class behind,'' says Representative Charles Rangel of New York, the senior Democrat on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee.