Corporate taxes up...as is government spending

From the AP:

The federal government posted the first budget surplus for December in three years as corporate tax payments hit an all-time high, helping offset a record level for spending, the Treasury Department reported Thursday.

The department said in its monthly budget report that government receipts surpassed spending by $10.98 billion last month. A year ago, the government ran a deficit of $2.85 billion in December.
...
Corporate income tax collections totaled a record $73.5 billion last month, surpassing the old record of $72 billion set in September.

What? Tax cuts have resulted in more government revenue? NO WAY! Who knew? Oh, yeah...those of us with a basic grasp of economics not tainted by emotional irrational thought process!

However, let's get this straight: there is no such thing as a corporation paying taxes. Corporations simply collect taxes! Corporations are incapable of paying taxes; therefore, corporate "income taxes" are simply taxes on shareholders, employees, and consumers. The businesses simply collect the money (in the form of savings due to smaller salaries/wages, smaller/no dividends, consumer purchases of higher-than-would-otherwise-be priced goods, etc.) Don't take my word for it, though...just look here.

Anyway, economics lesson over. Continuing:

President Bush has vowed to cut the deficit in half by 2009 and still preserve the tax cuts he pushed through Congress in his first term.

Treasury Secretary John Snow said this week that the administration plans to lower the deficit through stringent controls on spending, which he said would be evident in the budget proposal for 2007 that Bush will send to Congress in early February.

Excuse me for a moment, please. (BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! *snort* AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!) There...I feel much better now (wiping tear from corner of eye).

So the administration that has spent like a drunken sailor, that threatened to veto the transportation bill if it exceeded his spending cap but subsequently signed it anyway, that ran twice as a fiscal "conservative"...is finally going to throw down the gauntlet on overspending? FIVE years after getting inaugurated the first time, and he's JUST NOW getting around to enacting "stringent" spending controls? You'll have to forgive my cynicism and skepticism, but I'll believe that when I see it!

In the 1980's, Reagan cut taxes, and revenues to the Treasury nearly doubled. However, a spend-happy Democrat Congress pissed all of the extra money away every time. Now, Bush's tax cuts have caused revenues to the Treasury to increase markedly, and a spend-happy Republican Congress pisses it all away (and I mean on non-defense spending). Libertarian, anyone?