Remember when Republicans were “deficit hawks?”
They used to say, “We can’t afford that. The deficit must be controlled.” Now they are crazed for tax cuts, and the deficit is soaring. To pay it down, they will attack every social program: Medicare, Social Security, everything but defense.
James Hochman of the Washington Post says the Administration is focusing on DC politics to draw attention away from substantive issues.
“THE BIG IDEA: Speculation about who wrote that anonymous op-ed continues to be an absorbing parlor game, but few people are talking about the crushing national debt.
“Despite a strong economy, which could typically be counted on to reduce the deficit, a new Congressional Budget Office report shows that the federal government spent $895 billion more over the past 11 months than it took in. That’s a 33 percent increase from last year. This is the result of massive tax cuts combined with dramatic increases in spending and inaction on entitlements.
“Trillion-dollar annual deficits are going to be the new normal. The money being borrowed to pay for this bender will eventually need to be repaid — with interest. Yet House Republicans are talking this week about a second round of tax cuts that could cost another $2 trillion over the next decade. Privately they admit they’re doing this to score political points against Democrats in an election year. They know that there won’t be support in the Senate to make last year’s reductions of individual rates permanent because there won’t be 60 votes.
“Notably, lawmakers are facing no discernible political blowback this fall for such risky fiscal policies. Perhaps this is because people are on a sugar high made possible by what’s essentially a stimulus. Or maybe it’s because unemployment is low and stock prices are high.
“Another factor: The American people are more focused on the daily drama emanating from the reality television presidency than they are substantive policy issues. Meanwhile, the administration is making meaningful moves every day — and we’re covering them — but these stories are often overlooked in favor of distracting shiny objects. This week has already offered several fresh illustrations of this dynamic.
“– President Trump got a lot of attention for using the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks to launch a fresh round of dubious attacks on the Justice Department via Twitter. Picking up a claim from Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), Trump accused former FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page of employing a “media leak strategy” to undermine him. Then he blamed the bureau and DOJ for not doing anything about it. “The claim from Meadows is debatable,” Matt Zapotosky reports. “Strzok’s attorney said his client’s reference to a ‘media leak strategy’ was an effort to stem unauthorized disclosures of information.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I am an engineer, not an economist. If you check the recent history. you will see that ever since the end of WW2, that every tax cut enacted (federal level) has resulted in increased tax revenue.
Tax cuts spur the economy by putting more money in private hands, that people can spend on goods/services. This spurs demand, and the economy picks up speed. More economic activity, results in more tax collections.
I never met a tax cut I did not like.
Charles,
Do you expect to get Social Security. More tax cuts and you will have to spend your savings.
I paid my taxes. They went up.
Only the richest taxpayers got the benefit of the 2017 cut.
Why don’t you care about deficits?
Social Security is a separate program, that is not part of the federal budget. (It is in serious actuarial trouble, no doubt).
I expect to receive payments from the Social Security program.
I pay taxes as well. My take-home pay went up slightly, with the last tax cut (hooray).
I am NOT rich. I did receive a small taxcut.
I do care about the federal deficit. That is why I support spurring the economy with additional taxcuts. More economic growth, will result in more revenue for the federal treasury.
Some people wailed and screamed about the Reagan/Kemp/Roth tax cuts back in 1981. The sky was falling, and the feds were going to lose revenue.
The tax cuts spurred the greatest economic boom since the end of WW2.
You are a total Trumper. Real Republicans oppose deficits.
You are an historian. Please remember: The revolutionary war, the War of 1812, and the Mexican war of 1848, were all fought on credit. And the US federal budget was balanced during most of the Great depression of the 1930s.
Not all deficit spending is bad, not all balanced budgets are good.
Even the great Republican icon, Dwight Eisenhower, supported deficit spending to spur the economy.
The “president” was known as the King of Debt in private life. He borrowed heavily from Russian oligarchs because no American bank would lend him money.
Republicans prided themselves on their opposition to deficits. We waste billions of dollars paying debt service on loans instead of investing in our economy.
Fess up, Charles, you are a sucker for whatever Trump does.
$2 trillion in debt sounds good to you.
Charles, why are you drinking this poison Kool-aid? Educate yourself and avoid the far right’s propaganda machine funded by the same billionaires getting the deepest tax cuts.
Make an attempt to erase your dangerous ignorance.
The growing federal debt is a short term band-aid that leaks and the wound never heals.
“Over the long term, a growing federal debt is like driving with the emergency brake on. As the debt-to-GDP ratio increases, debt holders could demand larger interest payments. They want compensation for an increasing risk they won’t be repaid. Diminished demand for U.S. Treasury would further increase interest rates. That would slow the economy.”
https://www.thebalance.com/the-u-s-debt-and-how-it-got-so-big-3305778
Five Reasons Why You Should Worry About The Federal Debt
https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddavenport/2018/02/28/five-reasons-why-you-should-worry-about-the-federal-debt/#5607e89b4932
Top 10 Reasons Why The National Debt Matters
https://www.pgpf.org/fiscal-top-ten
The total federal debt now exceeds $20 (twenty) Trillion dollars. I am not a fan of this, but it is the reality. The deficits have increased under both Repub and Dem administrations, and congresses controlled from both parties.
There is enough blame to go around for everyone.
Keep in mind, only the congress can spend, and only the congress can tax.
Bill Clinton was able to work with the opposition party, to bring in a balanced budget. He deserves credit for this accomplishment.
Charles, while it is correct that the debt grew out-of-control under every president since President Trickle-Down RayGun, Republican presidents are responsible for the lion’s share of the debt.
Charles makes a good point that both parties have contributed to raising the deficit over the years. I wouldn’t even give Clinton much credit for balancing the budget. That was more a consequence of less interest in defense spending between Soviet collapse and 9/11.
However. Tax-cuts as stimulus is a tricky business with mixed results. It worked briefly under Reagan, but was followed up with several tax raises to rein things in. Bush tax cuts were not similarly reined in, & whatever benefit accrued was snuffed out by the financial crisis.
Our most recent tax cut was ill-advised per even trickle-down economists, as market was on a long bull run & recovery moving along decently on the cuts still in place since Bush. Trump-voters may have welcomed them, since the recovery has been slow to reach mid/ working class. But by now all but the blind 30% core will have observed there’s neither a big boost to take-home pay nor a big influx of well-pd jobs opening up from the 115th Congress’ gift to the 1%.
At least Democrat deficit spending has generally resulted in programs which improve the QOL of regular folks.
Democratic deficits come from social spending to help people.
Republican deficits come from heavy defense spending.
Charles, individuals that are GOP supporters that only listen to Republican propoganda and/or they are Fox followers, that is a recipe for Trumpish ignorance.
“The GOP has historically claimed reducing the top tax rate will create economic growth, but that hasn’t always happened.” …
“The Congressional Research Service published a paper in 2012 that found no correlation between top tax rates and economic growth. Congressional Republicans protested the findings, and the service briefly withdrew the paper.” …
“POLITICO looked at each time the country changed the top income tax rate and the following five years of GDP per capita growth rate. The results are similar to the CRS findings: changing the top income tax rate does not have a predictable effect on economic growth.” …
“Since World War II, the tax rate has changed significantly six times. The effects on the economy were different each time: the tax rate on high income earners has no relationship to economic growth.”
https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/gop-tax-rate-cut-wealthy/
Nice Research.
Excellent, Lloyd.
Absolutely false. Revenue plummeted with the Reagan Tax cut. . You better stick with engineering because those of us who have memories remember that Paul Volker became Fed Chair in July 1979 and went on a war on inflation with the Prime rate rising to 21% in 1980. There was a Volker miracle a severe recession caused by those interest rates followed by a rapid recovery when they came down. The expansion had nothing to do with Reagan who had to raise taxes 3 times and Quadrupled the Deficit by the time Bush left office.
Clinton raised taxes and the economy grew as the debt shrunk. The Shrub tax cuts did crap as well. Again the economy was sustained by a housing bubble of epic proportions. As he funded wars off budget and doubled the debt.
But printing money does stimulate the economy somewhat, whether you print it and drop it from helicopters in the form of tax cuts or spend it on infrastructure like Roads and Schools.
In one case you provide a Public good. In the other, you make the 1% fabulously wealthy. Then you cut social spending and the earned benefits of working Americans. One of Reagan’s tax hikes was to social security. Talk about robbing from the middle class to give to the wealthy.
Absitively, posilutely. But all this posturing on deficits and the debt is a red herring. For Republicans, the issue doesn’t matter when it suits them and it’s an existential threat to future generations when Dems have some power. It’s that simple. There is no principle involved. If there were, they’d be serious about creating responsible debt: investments in people and their potential, not portfolios.
The real issue is that since 1994 Republicans have given up all pretense; they are not interested in governing, but in profiting and creating the illusion for their clueless minions that they too might profit one day. They are interested in power. At the federal level, they’ve killed the the appropriations process and thus everything that makes the institution function as it should. At the state level they’ve been willing lapdogs of ALEC’s agenda of exploitation and not on issues that matter to the people of the states. At the local levels they have they fight battles on national issues upon which they have no influence while ignoring schools, roads, bridges and fire and police protection. At all levels, governing is not an issue. Winning and sticking it opponents is.
And the issue of less taxes is also a red herring. It’s not about spending, it’s about responsible, accountable spending to address public needs and dreams. If these folks who claim there is no such thing as a bad tax cut, then by their logic, all functions of government would function wonderfully if there were no taxes. Yet they control the terms of the debate, thanks in large part to the “librul” media. Ideas from the right are somehow serious and those of the left are loony. Yet they never correct the image that their “left” is actually a center-left bundle of ideas that have overwhelming public support if actually acted upon.
Here is a report from the Wall Street Journal:
Q When Reagan left office, real federal revenue was more than 19% higher than it was the day of his first inauguration. A major recession had been overcome, inflation had been broken, the tax code had been indexed to eliminate bracket creep, and the largest tax cut of the postwar era had been implemented. The Reagan tax cuts and the boom they created stand as the most successful policy initiative and recovery of the postwar era—the polar opposite of Mr. Obama’s program and economy. END Q
see the article:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/reagan-cut-taxes-revenue-boomed-1501800678
The record of history is clear.
GregB
Only one disagreement who and where is the “Librul” media. The neo-liberal media I have no problem finding. On second thought I guess that is your point.
You’re right, you’re not an economist.
Here’s “the failing Washington Post’s” basis for giving this assertion three Pinocchis: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/12/07/history-lesson-do-big-tax-cuts-pay-for-themselves/?utm_term=.7c18ab61df55
Charles says: “I never met a tax cut I did not like”.
It’s hard to believe that Charles was celebrating after the Bush-Cheney tax cut threw out country into a huge financial mess. I guess that Charles hated the great economy of the Clinton tax INCREASE years but celebrated when the country was almost financially ruined thanks to the Bush-Cheney tax cut that turned a surplus into more deficit spending so that the rich could get richer and the middle class could have a few more dollars that didn’t help when the highways and bridges were falling apart and there was no money for relief from natural disasters and other society spending that made our country strong.
The Republicans know that their past interest in the every-increasing national debt is hot air. They are notoriosly willing to add to it, recently lifting caps on military spending. They will use the unprescedented debt as an excuse to all benifit programs except for the very rich who are getting tax breaks galore. They will use the debt as an excuse to extract profits from every public benifit program, including Medicaid, Medicare, public lands and public schools.
Absolutely right. Hedge funder Pete Peterson spent $1/2 billion creating the deficit alarm PR a few years ago. He got nowhere with that path so, an end run is happening- driving up the debt to justify privatization of Social Security. It’s what overlords do.
Gates’ Microsoft co-founder spent big this year to keep the House, Republican in 2018. He and Gates spent $1/2 mil. to defeat the reelection of Washington state judges who rendered verdicts favorable to public schools. Arnold and Gates bashed public pensions.That creates the playbook for Social Security privatization. Charles and David Koch’s brethren in colonialism.
I am old enough to remember after WWII when the taxes on the rich were close to 90%. That was when our country prospered. They could avoid some or most of the tax IF they invested that money in their business, not give huge amounts of money to their CEOs.
The same was true in Minnesota when a Republican governor RAISED taxes by about 2% as I recall. They got out of debt in about 2 years.
Tax cuts for the wealthy? WHEN has it resulted in the average citizen? Go back to Medieval times even.
The income law as passed under the Trump administration will save Trump [Forbes crunched the numbers: It looks like up to $11 million a year]
Does that help to understand why there is less money for social programs that help the poor and needy?
Social Security? To the best of my knowledge IF the very wealthy had to pay the same tax rate as do we on ALL their income as do we, SS would be OK for a LONG time.
Please do not be fooled by the propaganda put out by the very wealthy who have a very big ax to grind.
After World War 2, the owners of major corporations felt a responsibility to and for their workforce. There was not the huge gap in income between CEOs and workers as today.
We cannot sustain continued tax breaks that build up the deficit while overspending on the military, the NSA and, god forbid, The Wall. Why do people support Trump? The only thing I can come up with is that Fox followers really have no idea of what is happening. [Study: someone who watched only Fox News would be expected to answer 1.04 domestic questions correctly compared to 1.22 for those who watched no news at all.]
………………………………………………..
FOCUS: Treason? Why Not!
By Dana Milbank, The Washington Post
12 September 18
…Woodward has left us with so many troubling images of Trump — incompetence, erratic behavior, ignoring advice — that it is a close competition to determine the most worrisome. I nominate Trump’s Louis XIV-style belief that he is the state, that his self-interest and the national interest are the same.
News he doesn’t like is “fake.”
Actions he doesn’t like are “illegal.”
People he doesn’t like are “traitors.”
Trump says the famed journalist and author should be disbelieved because “I don’t talk the way I am quoted.” But Woodward’s Trump sounds exactly like the Trump we hear daily….
https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/52246-focus-treason-why-not
It’s off topic but how far can this country go with the Orange one in charge?
………………………….
Video: “Fear: Trump in the White House”
Bob Woodward joins Morning Joe
Matt Ross
Published on Sep 12, 2018
By referring to Social Security (SS) and Medicare as “entitlements,” those programs are being lumped together with the other social programs that Republicans hate and want to eliminate or privatize.
In truth, SS & Medicare are earned benefits and should always be called that, because all workers have to pay for those programs with each and every paycheck they receive. At age 65, even if retired, workers are also automatically charged monthly Medicare premiums, and must pay for the costs of medications, too. Plus, even if retired and drawing SS retirement checks, if they continue to work, SS and Medicare are still deducted from their paychecks.
The biggest problem is the cap on high income workers who don’t have to pay in any more to SS and Medicare when they achieve incomes above $128,400 (in 2018). https://www.ssa.gov/planners/maxtax.html
If anyone is entitled in this country, it’s the rich who can well afford to pay more for SS than the 94.6% of us earning below $128K annually are able to pay. https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/12/10/what-is-the-2018-maximum-social-security-tax.aspx
With such an inequitable distribution of wealth, clearly,this is not the fair and equal country we have been erroneously led to believe it is.
Agree with your pointing to the very term “entitlements” to imply that citizens have no right to affordable health care, some degree of comfort in old age, some benefits for children not yet of age, public schools, public lands, clear air and water. The entitled today are the robber barons, and he politicians who give away tax breaks to persons and groups not need in of them. I know of no national study that offers insights on the amount of money public schools give up to corparate tax beaks on dubious promises that jobs will be created in “x” many years and the business climate improved.
The GOP wants to change the narrative about SS and Medicare. They even refuse to call the oligarchs, the entitled ones.
Excellent post, homelesseducator. I’m guessing you had to do a little research to come up w/the numbers in your persuasive 3rd & 4th paras: those numbers should be all over the news regularly & in immediate recall for every registered voter.
Bethree5, You made me realize that I didn’t highlight another pertinent fact that I added in my last post below, so I’m going to do it here: The lawmakers in Congress are part of the less than 6% of the population who are earning over $128K. In fact, unless they are in a Congressional leadership position, the salary for all Representatives and Senators is $174K in 2018, which is decided annually by a POTUS executive order. https://work.chron.com/average-salary-newly-elected-congressman-7774.html
Thank you, Bethree5! I included links to the sources so all could see they’re not “alternative facts.” (Sorry, I didn’t notice your post until after I wrote my other post below)
Charles
C’mon, wake up and smell the coffee.
Hypocrisy – for decades who whined and filibustered and threatened to close down the government because the deficit was getting too big? GOP
Hypocrisy – yes, I know but here goes… If PRESIDENT(ial) Obama had suggested increasing the deficit or reducing taxes, the gop would have gone nuts. “How dare you liberal anti-war socialists put debt on future generations? We won’t be unable to support the military.” (Heck, the NFL on a knee hurts the military, right?)
(Lack of) Empathy – lower taxes. Take away services.* Well, at least from the people who don’t look and think like “us.” Hurricane in Texas. Spend those tax dollars and beef up the coffers of the private corporations who do the work. Hurricane in Puerto Rico? Not so much. Federal funds for education? Slash the budget.
*Services – you will say this does not affect state and local taxes. You’d argue it helps the economy and jobs. Not in my state. But here’s the deal. TRICKLE DOWN THEORY. When the president or Ms DeVos want anything, their answer is “leave it up to the States.” Nice. But where do STATES get that funding? State and local. And, put a TAX CAP on local funds, the wealthy white boys can defeat school budgets, take their federal slice of the pie, and go bowling for vouchers (or golf with the president to trade loyalty for vouchers and tax credits).
Bubbles – how many of these folks send their kids to private schools, use public parks and pools and golf courses, or have set foot in an urban neighborhood. They have no idea – NO idea what it takes to educate a child today. Their biggest problem is their Nannies may not speak English so their kids are learning more international languages than English.
Headlines, Elevator Speeches, Flip Flopping – You can write all that wonderful economic and financial explanation and hypotheses and fortunately there are others here to contest it – – but you proverbial Joe Six Pack and So Called Base get all their news (I use that loosely) from the president’s tweets (how embarrassing is that phrase), from Koch owned publications, fox, and if you all have it your way, from the pulpit. They don’t read the print not to mention the fine print. And, when the president changes his mind (definitely not any congress(white)men standing up to him, (bump stocks, DACA, the biggest wall ever, N. Korea, trade…) he HIDES IT from his base.
Charles – if you are still reading – – – you follow this blog so you must have some interest and investment in education, heck, maybe public education. We are the ONLY COUNTRY (for now) that claims to and works our you know what’s off to educate EVERY STUDENT. Too bad the president and the too-scared-to-speak-up legislators don’t understand or agree with that. But I guess the too-scared-to-speak-up Supreme Court new majority will take care of that.
I apologize for getting carried away and if I made assumptions – well, just pass it along to another isolationist loyalist who should read it.
Charles reads very selectively
I find myself in agreement with most of your points. I do not think that the USA is the only country that has a solid commitment to educating its citizens. Fact is, that public education (k-12) is primarily a state/municipal responsibility. About 90% of the funding is non-federal.
Sadly, in spite of the fact that we operate an educational system, we are failing many of our minority children. According to this article in the WashPost
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2017/12/04/u-s-high-school-graduation-rates-rise-to-new-high/?utm_term=.e9333793b444
Only 76% of African-American high school students are graduating on time.
BTW- I read all kinds of information, from a variety of sources.
Charles,
Since you read all kinds of sources, please read my book “Reign of Error”
When It Reigns It Poors
Corporate-owned financial institutions pull off the most massive theft of the Common Wealth in American history and the corporate-owned media wring their hands about the “economic downturn”. We are told it’s time for “austerity measures” and “shared sacrifice” — all the while we stare a tidal wave of slush funds in the face that corporate lords have been stashing away for a reigny day, the day they finally bust us down to the estate of serfs and guildless peons once again.
Neo-cons, Neo-libs, and their Neo-speak economists — their snoots so full of theory they long ago lost the sense it takes to “follow the money” no matter how bad it stinks up their audit trails — divert the People with tales of the Invisible Hand while light fingers lift the loot in broad daylight from under their noses. “It’s an Act of God, a natural disaster. No one mugged thee, Nemo did it.”
But the game is up. We see it now. Irresponsibility is its name, it’s out of control, it’s past the tipping point, and it just keeps howling for more, more, more.
https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2012/08/20/when-it-reigns-it-poors/
Many people confuse a legal entitlement with a “sense of entitlement”. I recommend looking the word up in a dictionary.
You have got to be kidding. It’s about time the public realized they’re being conned by rich, economically conservative Libertarians and Neoliberals (in both parties) who claim to want less government and no deficits, while what they are really doing is jockeying for power over the masses, as they pray at the alter of the almighty dollar! Maybe the public will be more motivated to come out in greater numbers to vote.
Since politicians are the lawmakers, they know very well what “legal entitlements” are and they are also well aware that they have the power to take them away just by changing laws and budgets. RWNJs want to do away with all remnants of the New Deal that brought us earned benefit programs like Social Security and Medicare –which we pay into for decades but receive no interest. They also want to get rid of other safety nets, like disability, TANF and SNAP, affordable health care, and even public schools, public libraries, public parks, etc. That’s because many of them, especially Republicans, don’t believe the people of this country are entitled to have anything declared a public good, because they see them as handouts to the unworthy (when they could be used to fill the pockets of their relatives and cronies).
So they will bust a gut trying to monetize virtually everything to the benefit of corporations and entrepreneurs and repeatedly give tax breaks to the already advantaged. That includes themselves, since they are part of the less than 6% of the population who are earning over 128K. In fact, unless they are in a Congressional leadership position, the salary for all Representatives and Senators is $174K in 2018, which is decided annually by a POTUS executive order. https://work.chron.com/average-salary-newly-elected-congressman-7774.html
Imagine if POTUS required that lawmakers be paid minimum wage and get no pensions or free health care, just like the rest of us –who they think don’t deserve to have a “sense of entitlement” to the public good, safety nets or a decent life… Of course, it would also have to be required that lawmakers not engage in any influence peddling, i.e., they could not take money from wealthy donors. There would need to be an election campaign fund, too, and candidates would all have to be required to spend the same amount.
Not going to happen. At the very least, we’d need a swing vote on the Supreme Court. (Anyone feeling compelled to grab a pitchfork should get out and vote instead!)
If the revenue gets small enough, the bathtub drowning will begin… Already the GOP is waiting for things to devolve to the point where they will have “no choice” but to cut the programs put in place by FDR…
Trump has now made the 5,000 mark for false or misleading claims.
The president’s 5,001st claim was another tweet: he claimed that the administration “did an unappreciated great job” dealing with Hurricane Maria in 2017 when it struck Puerto Rico.
That’s an average of 8.3 Trumpian claims a day, but in the past nine days, the president has averaged 32 claims a day.
………
I think this proves the Orange one is getting increasingly frustrated.
How’s this for a whopper? Now it’s the Democrats fault.
……..
Trump questions number of deaths attributed to Hurricane Maria, falsely says Democrats created a higher count to make him look bad
A sweeping report from George Washington University released last month estimated there were 2,975 “excess deaths” in the six months after the storm made landfall in Puerto Rico in September 2017.
Trump said on Twitter that “they had anywhere from 6 to 18 deaths” at the time he visited the island after the storm.
So he threw rolls of paper towels to ease the suffering of the people
“So he threw rolls of paper towels to ease the suffering of the people”
Definitely what they needed. I never could quite figure out what they were supposed to do with this most vital of relief supplies.
speduktr: The BIG question is whether or not Trump is saving enough paper towels for the current crisis on our east coast. [I’m also not sure how paper towels helped anyone. They mop up SO much water when it is 10 feet deep.] Was Trump the brains behind this operation?
If you haven’t seen it yet. The New Yorker Magazine published a cartoon this week showing Trump practicing for the latest hurricane.
I hope this link opens to the cartoon so you can see how the New Yorker shows Trump getting ready.
https://mail.google.com/mail/#label/Cartoon+Lounge+from+the+New+Yorker/165d578e31b24cbf
“The President Preps for Hurricane Florence”
LLoyd, Thanks for the info, but your link goes straight to G-Mail, so I found a direct link to the cartoon here: https://www.newyorker.com/cartoons/daily-cartoon/thursday-september-13th-hurricane-florence
“In our negotiations , Congressional Democrats have been fighting for INCREASES
in funding for defense.” Nancy P.
“We fully support “clock-work orange” defense department’s request” Chuck S.
Deficits come from heavy defense spending.
Bail-outs/QE comes from heavy fed key-stroke money.
“Last year, congressional Democrats did what might seem like a surprise, given public posturing, and voted overwhelmingly for the massive defense authorization: 60% in the House and 89% in the Senate.
This year, things are a little different Democrats still fell over themselves to support an even bigger military budget. They just did it a little earlier.
This year, 67.5% of House Democrats and 85% of Senate Democrats voted in favor
of a $716 billion military spending bill for the 2019 federal fiscal year.
This is $82 billion higher than the current budget, which itself was more than the Trump administration requested.”
Damn republicans…
How about this quote. Does the Orange one know that Puerto Ricans are Americans?
………………………………………………………….
“The safety of American people is my absolute highest priority,” President Trump said this week. “We are sparing no expense.”
Oh yeah, he knows, but he also knows that they can’t vote for him. He knows they’re people of color, too, and it only takes one or two strikes to be on the outs for Trump.
He just really doesn’t care about them. He cares only about himself and his own image. His narcissism dominates everything he does, so as reported by Senator Merkley (D-OR) on Rachel Maddow’s show the other day, $10M that was earmarked for FEMA was just transferred to ICE — at the start of hurricane season…
On Maddow it was reported yesterday that Trump’s administration also just transferred to ICE $29M from the Coast Guard, which is another critical resource for hurricane disaster relief.
Trump probably thinks he’s feeding his base, but since the hurricane is headed for mainland Southern states, ya gotta wonder… how many in his base are actually being sacrificed? He’s really lousy at a lot of things, including playing politics.