One of the organizing principles of the conservative movement revolves around always cutting taxes and resisting any moves towards raising revenues. Hundreds of conservatives have even signed Grover Norquist’s pledge to never, under any circumstances, support a tax increase.

Gov. Nathan Deal (R-GA) made tax cuts a major part of his campaign promise last fall. In an ad put out by his campaign in February 2010, Deal bragged about running on “tax-cutting policies.” Watch it:

Now that Deal is Governor, the state legislature is currently drafting major tax legislation. Deal has been a guiding hand in the negotiations over the bill, and stands behind the latest version of the bill being debated among senate and house legislators. The bill does, as Deal promised, cut many taxes.

For example, it lowers the state personal income tax rate from 6 to 4.5 percent. Yet at the same time, the bill is being touted as being revenue neutral — meaning that revenue has to come from somewhere. Georgia Republicans, under the leadership of Deal, have decided to make up the difference by eliminating a whole host of tax exemptions and increases in sales taxes. The end result? Georgians making over $180,000 would see steep tax cuts while middle class Georgians making between $20,000 and $180,000 would see tax hikes. This chart compiled by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Jay Bookman using data from Georgia State University’s Fiscal Research Center illustrates this:

While negotiations over the tax bill are far from over, it appears that Deal and his Republican colleagues are standing behind a template that is becoming all too familiar for right-wing legislators: cut taxes on the wealthiest Americans and then demand that middle class and working class Main Street Americans pay out more in tax hikes or in reduced spending to health care, education, and other important investments. As ThinkProgress previously reported, at least a dozen states are currently pursuing corporate tax cuts while at the same time increasing burdens on working families.

On Tuesday, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) plans to lay out his proposed budget for the next fiscal year. Promoting his plan on Fox News Sunday this morning, Ryan made clear that his plan for deficit reduction would demand drastic spending cuts shouldered on the backs of low- and middle-income Americans without asking for similar sacrifice from the wealthy. Asked repeatedly by host Chris Wallace whether he’ll eliminate tax breaks for oil companies, Ryan hemmed and hawed without giving a clear answer:

WALLACE: A lot of Democrats that are already saying, even before they’ve seen your budget, that you do all of this balancing of the budget on the spending side, and unlike the President’s debt commission, you don’t do it on the revenue side. Do you eliminate tax breaks? Do you bring in new revenue by eliminating, for instance, tax breaks for oil companies?

RYAN: We don’t have a tax problem. The problem with our deficit is not because Americans are taxed too little. The problem with our deficit is because Washington spends too much money. … So we’re not going to down the path of raising taxes on people. […]

WALLACE: But for instance, you will not eliminate tax breaks for Big Oil and Gas?

RYAN: Those are the kinds of details that we’ll come out later with, that the Ways and Means Committee will work on. We’re not going to go into the little details of which tax expenditure goes and which tax expenditure stays.

Watch it:

Ryan has no problem discussing details of his budget plan that impose higher taxes on 90 percent of Americans and relies on squeezing Medicare and Medicaid. But when pressed on details about cutting corporate welfare, he had nothing to say. But previously, he’s been more blunt, calling the idea of ending taxpayer handouts to oil and gas companies “ridiculous economics.”

Ryan is wrong about one key point — there is, in fact, “a tax problem.” Federal tax receipts are at the lowest levels since 1950. As this graph produced by CAP’s Director for Tax and Budget Policy Michael Linden demonstrates, tax receipts as a percentage of GDP dropped precipitously following the Bush tax cuts:

According to the Office of Management and Budget, corporate tax receipts will account for just 7.2% of federal revenues in 2010, with large corporations contributing less than one-sixth as much as small business and individual taxpayers to the federal treasury. Exxon-Mobil, for instance, paid $15 billion in taxes in 2009, but not a penny of those taxes went to the American Treasury. Because oil and gas companies receive generous tax subsidies, the U.S. government loses about $4 billion in revenue a year.

Paul Ryan’s budget will demand that working Americans give up health care and pension benefits that they’ve earned, while asking nothing from hugely profitable corporations that are failing to meet their tax responsibilities.

While any sober solution to the country’s deficit problem should include both revenue enhancement and spending cuts, conservatives have been completely unwilling to even consider tax increases, proposing steep cuts that will do little to solve the deficit, while doing much to hurt the middle class and the most vulnerable. Toeing that conservative line on Fox News Sunday today, Fox personality Brit Hume argued that cutting taxes will actually lead to increased tax revenue. Fox analyst Juan Williams responded by noting this is often not the case, citing the fact that G.E. — the nation’s largest company — paid nothing in taxes last year. Williams’ response flummoxed Hume, who appeared dumbfounded and at a loss for words. Host Chris Wallace had to jump in to smooth things over with a joke:

WILLIAMS: You’re going on as if, you know what, we don’t know how in America how to help our own deficit problem. We do! We just have to tax people.

HUME: Juan, Juan. What we need is not higher tax rates. What we need is higher revenue. And how do you get higher revenues? You get higher revenues from an expanding economy. That’s where the big money comes from.

WILLIAMS: Yeah, and G.E. paying no taxes? That’s good for America? Come on, you know that’s not right.

[Pause]

WALLACE: I just want to say, I pay all my taxes!

Watch it: