A St. Louis activist saw a diary at Daily Kos urging Democrats to let the tax cut vote stand:

The answer is simple. The votes have been taken. Let the debate end there.

All of the tax cuts expire on January 31 because Republicans are unwilling to compromise.

The GOP has handed the Democrats the single best talking point ever handed to them, and they gave it up on a silver platter.

The Republicans did not vote for tax cuts.

Fine, let them be the anti-tax cut party. It’s how they voted, now let them reap the consequences of their actions.

The Democrats control the Senate and control the agenda. There’s no need to ever let tax cuts for the rich make it to the floor of the Senate. No tax cuts for the rich ever need get out of any committee.

This is the single best winning issue the Democrats could have.

So let them all expire and let the blame sit where it  belongs, with every Senator who voted “NO” to extending any tax cuts.

The activist agreed so much with the diarist that she wrote both Chuck Schumer and Claire McCaskill:

Dear Senator Chuck Schumer, 12-4-’10

Thank you for your efforts in the Senate today.

Please. Let all of the tax cuts expire. You can blame the Republicans. I’m middle class and don’t really like to pay more taxes, but I can absorb increased taxes. Use the money that comes from this tax expiration to pay for the unemployment tax extension.This will be my Christmas present.

Of course, if Democrats actually grew the guts to do that, the scream from Republicans would waken Ronnie Reagan. Let’s see. As soon as they  were through breathing into a paper bag, they’d start hypnotically repeating something like: “Democrats refuse to compromise so that middle class people can keep their tax cuts.”

But it’s a war of words I’d like to see. At the very least, more of the public would become aware of Republican obstructionism. (Right now I figure few people even know about the vote. The Sunday Post-Dispatch article about it, for example, was on page five, crowded off page one by a piece about a man freed from prison. While his story may be interesting, it doesn’t potentially affect every reader of the paper as the Saturday Senate vote did.)

So I e-mailed Schumer, basically repeating the activist’s message. But my e-mail to McCaskill said that and something more.

I assume that since you’re willing to go along with the  recommendation by the co-chairmen of the Deficit Commission that Social Security be raided again, you’ll have little problem finding the courage to increase taxes on middle and lower class citizens–especially since you can blame it on the Republicans.

And in case you think my snark is ill advised as a tactic of persuasion, just remember that she may not even see it as snark. She’s proud of her stand on Social Security. Okay, using the word “raided” might tip her off that I’m insincere. So be it.