President Obama, amid charges of waging class warfare, took to the podium Monday pushing for a tax hike on families earning more than $250,000 -- and an extension of the Bush-era tax rates for families making less than that.

The proposal comes just days after Obama courted the blue-collar vote in the battleground states of Ohio and Pennsylvania, where he talked frequently about middle-class values.

The pitch is the latest proposal from a White House that has had a complicated relationship with the Bush-era tax rates, which have been in effect for nearly a decade. Obama at first held back on letting any of those rates expire during the height of the recession, saying in 2009 that would be "the last thing you want to do" because it would "take more demand out of the economy."

He then negotiated with Republicans in 2010 to extend the rates for another two years.

But campaign adviser Robert Gibbs said over the weekend that Obama is now "100 percent committed" to ending the rates for those making over $250,000.

The announcement, coming at noon Monday, would let the rates expire only for those making over $250,000. It preempts a more sweeping proposal from congressional Republicans -- who will be negotiating for an extension of the Bush tax rates for everyone. Those rates expire at the end of the year.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell's office immediately panned the president's plan as a "call for tax hikes on small businesses."

The office noted that Obama said two years ago that letting the rates go up would be bad for the economy. On "CNN's State of the Union" Sunday, McConnell noted, "We have a slower growth rate today than we had then."

House Speaker John Boehner offered a similar rebuke, accusing Obama of "doubling down on his quixotic call for the same small businesses tax hikes that have been routinely rejected by the House and Senate."

Mitt Romney's campaign also pounced. "President Obama's response to even more bad economic news is a massive tax increase. It just proves again that the President doesn't have a clue how to get America working again and help the middle class," spokeswoman Andrea Saul said in a statement.

Obama's re-election campaign plans to use Washington's tax debate to ramp up its criticism of Romney. The campaign and its Democrat and Progressive allies have slammed the presumptive GOP nominee for not releasing several years of tax returns and for having some of his money in offshore bank accounts.

The strategy is aimed at portraying Romney, whose personal wealth could exceed $250 million, as disconnected from middle-class voters...

Obama is expected to promote his tax policy at a series of events this week in battleground states, including New Hampshire, Colorado and Nevada.

The president's shift to the tax debate follows Friday's lackluster jobs report showing the nation's unemployment rate stuck at 8.2 percent.

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Editor's Note: A further expansion of his class warfare campaign for re-election...First, the overwhelming majority of small business owners (read: job creators) make over $250,000 annually...Second, if he was serious about the debt and deficit he would insist on cuts to non-constitutionally mandated spending to balance the budget. If he was serious about the "justice for all" and not simply "social justice" he would mandate the elimination of the progressive tax structure and replace it with a tax structure that is mathematically equitable in the percentage of taxes taken from everyone, regardless of income level. Further, if he were serious about job creation, he would eliminate corporate taxes, recognizing that corporate taxes are simply passed on to the consumer. But he's not serious about solving these problems...he's only serious about sound bytes and photo ops, politics and re-election...


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