Washington’s debt “compromise” is a travesty of effective government. It only postpones the problem of federal spending and passes it to a commission that will decide where to make further cuts in public services.

Most importantly, it failed to close tax loopholes for billion-dollar corporations and the nation’s wealthiest citizens.

Make no mistake: Cutting social services is a form of taxation, for whatever the middle class loses will be made up out-of-pocket or by doing without, while the wealthy won’t be affected, for their well-being isn’t dependent on Medicare, Social Security or unemployment benefits.

Curb spending? OK, but making the middle class bear most of the burden is unconscionable.

In a nation where some CEOs earn more than 300 times their average employee, where companies use tax loopholes to list profits in the billions, and where an Internal Revenue Service study indicates 1,400 millionaires paid no taxes whatsoever, balancing a budget on the backs of people with moderate incomes is unacceptable.

Stop giving the wealthy disproportionate discounts on the American dream. Maintaining tax breaks for the wealthiest 5 percent, while expecting everyone else to pay their share, isn’t good business, especially when corporations spend millions lobbying Congress for continuation of their privileges.

What’s happening is what one pundit calls “a strife of interests masquerading as a conflict of principles.” An apt summary, especially since Congress seems determined to protect the wealthy while imposing backdoor taxes, disguised as fiscal prudence, on those least able to afford them.

Richard Matthews, Phillips