In 2001, when Republicans passed the Bush income tax cuts, budget rules forced them to estimate the cost over the following decade.

And they were dishonest. They set the tax cuts to expire after nine years, a gimmick to reduce the stated cost. The plan was to renew the cuts when the time came.

Now the time is here, and the gimmick has backfired. If Congress does nothing, income taxes will rise at the end of the year, even on the middle class.

President Obama wants to prevent that. He would let taxes rise only on earnings over $250,000. The wealthy would still get their share because the lower rates would apply to the first $250,000 they earn. In fact, they would still get a much larger break than the typical middle-class family.

But that’s not enough for Republicans in Washington. They want to renew the original Bush tax cuts, in full. And again, they are being dishonest.

Leading the charge is Minority Leader John Boehner, who argues that Obama’s plan would burden small businesses and kill jobs. What he doesn’t say is that the vast majority of small-business owners earn less than $250,000. Only 3 percent of those reporting small-business income earn more.

Are we really supposed to believe small businesses will wither if the top rates are restored to the levels of the Clinton boom years? For the record, small business added jobs during the 1990s at double the pace they did in the 2001-2006 period.

And what about the deficit? Extending these tax cuts would force the treasury to borrow an additional $700 billion over the next decade. What Republicans are suggesting is this: Let’s borrow money from the Chinese and hand it over to the Americans who need it least. More than half of the money would go to those earning at least $2 million a year.

Republicans used to be rational about taxes. Even Reagan raised taxes substantially when his first round of cuts caused the deficit to balloon. For today’s Republicans, tax cuts are orthodoxy. In boom or bust, facing a deficit or a surplus, they answer as predictably as a wind-up doll: Cut taxes.

A recent Gallup poll shows that most Americans agree with Obama on this. So if Boehner wants to fight this fight during an election season, let him bring it on. It is a revealing debate.