Compromise in Washington is absolutely, totally, completely dead

Well, it's been all but dead for a while now, but President Obama's plan to tax the rich - to the tune of $1.5 trillion over the next decade - really seals the deal. WSJ columnist Gerald Seib writes that the markers have been laid down - the president is going after tax increases (with substantial budget cuts), while Congressional Republicans say that tax increases are off the table. Both sides will now be taking their respective cases to the 2012 campaign.

At some level, of course, every election is about taxes. The level of taxation determines the size of government the country can afford, and size of government goes a long way toward determining the role government plays in the economy and the society. But the picture is more stark than normal, for two reasons. First, the yawning deficit has made the choices for dealing with it--spending cuts or tax increases--more acute. And second, the Republican presidential primary race has made the tax question more pronounced: At the heart of the tax debate lies the question of whether the tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush--one of the GOP's proudest accomplishments of the last decade--will survive the presidential campaign intact or not.