“This is so bad. We have just gotten list of amendments to be included in
bill NOT from our R colleagues, but from lobbyists downtown,” said Missouri Dem
Senator Claire McCaskill. “None of us have seen this list, but lobbyists have
it. Need I say more? Disgusting. And we probably will not even be given time to
read them.”
NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images
Donald Trump will be President and could have control of both the House and
Senate again. The same happened in 2017 when he last won on the campaign promise
to Drain the Swamp of corruption in Washington.
He didn’t succeed in his first term, actually creating a deeper swamp with
rampant corruption at almost all levels of government. Will he do better this
time; might he and his Republicans learn from their past mistakes?
Republicans will want more tax cuts, for starters, as well as extend the tax
cuts his administration engineered in 2017, The
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, that they passed with House and Senate majorities.
I
wrote at the time, “The Republicans tax bill has passed, and it is the
greatest theft of taxpayer monies in history; even greater than that of
Presidents’ Reagan and Bush I and II that began the immense transfer of wealth
to the wealthiest in 1980 with their tax cuts starving the government of much
needed revenues that would keep the federal deficits under control.”
Why? It was written by the very lobbyists Republicans and
the Trump administration had cultivated during his 2017 election.
More than 130 lobbyists were hired to work in his first administration, and
36
of them have blatant conflicts of interest, working on the same issues they
were lobbying on, in violation of Trump’s ethics rules, according to MarketWatch
economist Jeff
Nutting.
“This is so bad. We have just gotten list of amendments to be included in
bill NOT from our R colleagues, but from lobbyists downtown,” said Missouri Dem
Senator Claire McCaskill. “None of us have seen this list, but lobbyists have
it. Need I say more? Disgusting. And we probably will not even be given time to
read them.”
The bill cut Medicare and Medicaid benefits by $1.5 trillion and could add
$1.5 trillion to the federal deficit in 10 years according to the CBO. That’s $3 trillion taken from U.S. taxpayers for the biggest heist in history.
We know what happened when Republicans tried this taxpayer sleight of hand before.
President Reagan and congress had to raise taxes 11 times to make up the
deficits created by the first ‘trickle-down’ tax cuts in 1981. Two consecutive
recessions in 1981 and 1982 followed as Fed Chairman Paul Volcker raised
interest rates to record levels to choke off inflation at the same time.
Then GW Bush did the same in 2001-03, when he cut taxes again while paying
for the wars on terror, resulting in the largest federal deficit in history at
the time, as well as the Great Recession.
This did not generate enough tax revenue to pay for the additional debt, so
foreign governments and individuals will become more reluctant to invest in U.S.
debt, as the deficit continues to grow and interest rates rise.
It can happen again. It is suicidal economics. The U.S. won’t declare
bankruptcy. But it will saddle future generations with an impossible debt load
and prevent much needed public and private investment that would increase
productivity and boost growth.
This happened in 2017, and the stench of lobbyists filling the swamp became
so overwhelming in Donald Trump’s first term that it was the reason his
Republican majority were voted out of office, as I said.
Is there any reason to doubt it will happen again?
Harlan Green © 2024
Follow Harlan Green on Twitter: https://twitter.com/HarlanGreen
