Speaking of tipping points

The Liberals smell an opening here, and they're right. The Tories can bleat all they want that this is not news, that they told everyone long ago that they would reverse the Liberals' 1% income tax cut for 2006, that their tax cuts, including the 2% GST cut, far outweigh the Liberals' -- and they're right. But all the Grits have to say is: "The Tories will raise your taxes."
I predict we are going to hear that over and over from here on in: The Tories will raise your taxes. The Tories will raise your taxes. The Tories will raise your taxes. It doesn't matter that it's not the whole truth. It's true enough. In politics, that's (alas) the standard. (UPDATE: This would be the fourth Liberal news release in one day on the subject. Consider my prediction confirmed.)
Once again we see the consequences of the disastrous decision to cut the GST, at a cost of $8.5-billion a year, rather than the much larger -- and more productive -- cuts in income taxes the same money could have purchased. I've talked before about the price the country would pay for this, in forgone productivity increases. But the Tories may be about to pay the price politically.
It's January. People are gathering their tax records, getting ready for the ordeal to come. At the same time, they're about to get their first payslips of the new year, complete with tax cut. And they're being told: somebody's going to take this away? The Tories think the GST cut will trump this. But in a way, the income tax is more visible than the GST. You have to fill out a form. It takes hours, and at the end, you have to write the government a cheque. Or at least tot up the total amount deducted from your pay that year. The GST, by contrast, only dings you a little at a time. It's a sales tax, but unless you live in Alberta, you're paying provincial sales tax anyway. I hardly think about it any more.
The timing of this is important in another way. The press have spent the last several weeks beating up on Martin, and having a grand time at it. Chances are the reporters on the Harper plane are getting bored. This might be just the issue to even the scales, to show "balance," rather like a referee calling offsetting penalties. To say nothing of the media's interest in keeping the election a horse race.
If I were the Tories, I'd get their full platform out fast. And I'd make sure it included personal income tax cuts.