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United States Congress 5: Still Looking for a Spine


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"Here comes the next major GOP policy initiative. You’ll never guess what it is."

Spoiler

When American voters gave Republicans complete control of Washington in 2016, they knew they’d be getting some innovative, outside-the-box thinking on policy, particularly economic policy. I’m kidding — what they actually knew, or ought to have known, was that they’d be getting the same thing Republicans always advocate: tax cuts for the wealthy and slashing environmental and worker protections.

So it has come to pass. Having achieved those goals, particularly a $1.5 trillion tax cut that has predictably led to an unprecedented round of stock buybacks (and not investment and raises for workers), Republicans retreated to their policy war room, thought and debated and deliberated and analyzed, and came up with a bold new proposal for where to go next.

You’ll never guess what it is:

House Republicans bracing for November’s midterm elections unveiled a second round of tax cuts on Monday that could add more than $2 trillion to the federal deficit over a decade, aiming to cement the steep cuts they passed last fall despite criticisms of fiscal profligacy and tailoring their policies to help the rich.

The GOP’s “tax reform 2.0″ aims to make permanent the tax cuts for individuals that President Trump signed into law in December 2017, including the law’s temporary reductions in individual filers’ rates, a doubling of the Child Tax Credit, and cuts to the estate tax paid by a small fraction of the wealthiest families.

Critics have said the proposed changes would primarily benefit the wealthiest taxpayers, while Republicans have argued their tax cuts help fuel the American economy by putting more money in consumers’ hands.

“Critics have said” that the GOP plan would benefit wealthy people, in the same way critics have said that 2+2=4 and dropping a bowling ball on your foot could produce a sensation of pain.

Why would Republican do this? They aren’t going to vote on it before the November elections, and if those elections turn out the way most everyone expects, it’ll be moot once Democrats take over the House. So there are a number of reasons they might be offering this plan now. One is to lay down a marker so that if they do hold Congress, they can return to it next year. Another is that despite what the polls show about the tax cut they already passed, they believe in the power of tax cuts to win public support sooner or later.

But the most important reason is this: It’s what they really want.

Sometimes politicians take positions or actions they don’t really believe in, out of political expediency or because the alternative is worse. This is not one of those times. Republicans truly, deeply, sincerely, passionately believe that tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations are simply good. As far as they’re concerned, the taxing of corporations and the wealthy is just morally wrong, and anything they can do to ease the cruel burden under which our noble job creators suffer is an act of the utmost humanitarianism.

It’s why they always refer to tax cuts as “tax relief.” Once they come through with more cuts, the put-upon plutocrats will sigh, “Ahhhhh — what a relief!” and Republicans will know they have done what they came to Washington to do.

Tax cuts for the wealthy are the one thing that for Republicans is absolutely non-negotiable. When they assume power, there are certainly other things they want to do, but cutting taxes on the wealthy is the one thing they absolutely, positively will do. Nothing is more important.

And please, don’t be so gauche as to mention that were it enacted, this proposal would add hugely to the deficit Republicans pretend to care about. Yes, the Congressional Budget Office says the deficit will top $1 trillion in 2020 even under current law. But we’re all adults here: We know that the deficit is only a rhetorical tool used to justify things such as cutting the safety net or keeping federal worker pay down. It’s supposed to actually constrain what we do only when there’s a Democrat in the White House.

Republicans will insist that this time, the tax cuts really will create such an explosion of economic activity that they’ll pay for themselves and create a paradise of limitless prosperity. Sure, that’s what they say every time and it never happens. But sometimes you just need faith.

That is something Republicans have in infinite supply: faith that cutting taxes for corporations and the wealthy is righteous and glorious, the most honorable thing they could do with the power they hold. George W. Bush did it, Ronald Reagan did it, Donald Trump did it, and by God they’re going to keep doing it if it takes the last breath in their bodies.

 

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Huh. What a surprise. Nobody saw that coming, did they? Oh, wait...

New deficit numbers shred Republican talking points on tax breaks

Quote

It’s been a few months since Larry Kudlow, the director of the Trump White House’s National Economic Council, boasted that the U.S. budget deficit “is coming down, and it’s coming down rapidly.” This was, as regular readers know, spectacularly wrong. Though the deficit shrank during Barack Obama’s presidency, it’s grown considerably larger since Donald Trump took office.

How much larger? Thanks in large part to Republican tax breaks for the wealthy and big corporations, the latest tallies are jaw-dropping.

The U.S. budget deficit is reaching levels that are abnormally high for a robust economy, and lawmakers from both parties are proposing ideas that would make the deficit swell even further.

The government spent $895 billion more than it brought in from taxes and other revenue sources during the past 11 months, the Congressional Budget Office said this week, a 33 percent increase from one year before.

As the Washington Post’s report on this makes clear, the last time the unemployment rate was as low as it is now, the deficit literally did not exist – it was 2000, the end of the Clinton presidency, and the federal government ran a surplus – which stands in stark contrast to the fiscal landscape Americans currently see.

Circling back to our previous coverage, there are a few key angles to this to keep in mind. The first is that Donald Trump’s campaign assurances about balancing the budget and eliminating the national debt should be near the top of the list of his broken promises.

Second, it’s now painfully obvious that the Republican Party, which spent the Obama era pretending to care deeply about fiscal responsibility and the terrible burdens deficits place on future generations, operated in bad faith.

And third, every Republican who said the GOP tax breaks for the wealthy would pay for themselves ought to face some renewed questioning about how very wrong they were.

As we discussed a few months ago, it’s worth emphasizing that I’m not a deficit hawk, and I firmly believe that larger deficits, under some circumstances, are absolutely worthwhile and necessary.

These are not, however, those circumstances. When the economy is in trouble, it makes sense for the United States to borrow more, invest more, cushion the blow, and help strengthen the economy.

The Trump White House and the Republican-led Congress, however, decided to approve massive tax breaks for the wealthy and big corporations when the economy was already healthy – not because they were addressing a policy need, but because they were fulfilling an ideological goal.

And now that the deficit is spiralling, those same Republicans have decided that what the nation really needs is more tax breaks – none of which will be paid for – and cuts to Medicare and Social Security.

If there’s a compelling defense for such an approach, it’s hiding well.

 

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"How does Paul Ryan keep a straight face?"

Spoiler

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) delivered remarks at the Ronald Reagan Institute on Thursday afternoon praising U.S. leadership in the world. How he — one of President Trump’s most loyal apologists — keeps a straight face while extolling U.S. values and alliances, which Trump routinely trashes, remains a source of wonder.

“We have to be ambassadors for what we believe, wherever we are, without equivocation,” said the man who tolerates a president who praises Vladimir Putin and tells us the North Korean people love Kim Jong Un, their jailer. “A set of policies is not what convinces people to side with us—it is the idea of America that draws them to us,” he proclaims. “It is the idea of a country where the condition of your birth does not determine the outcome of your life. That is where our true power lies.” Except “the condition of your birth” does matter to Trump and to the GOP’s rabid base. They want people from Norway not “shithole countries.” Meanwhile, the Dreamers remain without a solution to their plight because Ryan won’t put a bill that could actually pass on the House floor.

The speaker continued:

I believe our friends want to side with us in a free-market, liberalized system. They just need to know that the U.S. will be there for the long haul. We must understand: The rules of the road for the 21st century economy are being written right now. Privacy, intellectual property, the way capital moves across borders today–these are all critical issues for the coming decades.

So the question is: Will we set the tone or will it be others who don’t share our values or ideals? Strong trade agreements and economic partnerships set a high standard and bring our allies into the fold—and they make us more secure. In short, free trade must be always be an active instrument of American leadership.

That’s odd considering Ryan also refused to put measures on the floor to reclaim Congress’s authority over tariffs. “President Reagan charted the right course—it’s peace through strength, pro-growth economy, clear moral leadership. It is not a new or magic formula,” Ryan declared. “What is needed is a new willingness to think big, go bold, and see things through. To show the largeness of spirit that this moment requires.” Or perhaps what is needed is a willingness to put country over party, to root out obscene corruption that would make tin-pot leaders blush, to stand up to a president who employs the Stalinist phrase “enemy of the people,” to refuse to confirm patently unqualified Cabinet officials, to decline to tolerate alt-right cranks in the White House and to censure a president who says there were “fine” people among the neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville, Va.

Interestingly, Ryan did not mention Trump’s name once in a speech heralding the legacy of Reagan. Maybe that’s a small sign of regret, a whiff of shame that he did not rebuke a president who stood for everything Reagan did not: protectionism, xenophobia, coddling dictators, ignoring advisers far more knowledgeable than he, shredding alliances. Or maybe he feared the crowd would boo.

Reagan’s legacy in foreign policy is secure and generally judged favorably 30 years after he left office. Ryan’s spinelessness and refusal to challenge a president who undermined American leadership will be remembered as well.

 

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Paul Ryan, still looking for a spine 

Betting deficits will be bad again once Democrats want to pass some laws

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Graham is shaming up to be the next Nunes.

 

(Autocorrect changed ‘shaping’ into ‘shaming’, but I think it’s weirdly apt, so I’m leaving it in)

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Another one of those weird American things that I just don't get: why are there citizens who cannot vote?

Not just DC, Puerto Rico and others too

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I wish the people of South Carolina would stop foisting Lindsey on the rest of us: "Lindsey Graham: Appoint special counsel to investigate ‘bureaucratic coup’ against Trump"

Spoiler

Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) said Sunday he believes “a bureaucratic coup” led by enemies of President Trump is taking place at the Justice Department, and the senator asked that a new special counsel be appointed to investigate.

Graham, a veteran member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, made the comments on “Fox News Sunday” in response to questions about a report that Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein suggested secretly recording Trump and possibly using the 25th Amendment to remove the president from office.

Graham said he didn’t favor firing Rosenstein, who has denied the report and said he never advocated for removal of the president. “He shouldn’t fire Rosenstein unless you believe Rosenstein’s lying,” Graham said.

Instead, the senator from South Carolina pointed his finger at others in the department who he said have “tried to destroy this president.” He specifically referred to former FBI officials Andrew McCabe, Lisa Page and Peter Strzok.

McCabe, a former FBI deputy director, was fired after being accused of making an unauthorized disclosure to the news media. Strzok, who helped lead the FBI inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, lost his job after officials discovered he had been exchanging anti-Trump text messages in 2016 with Page, a lawyer, who has also left the department.

“Before the election, the people in question tried to taint the election, tip it to Clinton’s favor; after the election, they’re trying to undermine the president,” Graham said. He added that he did not know “what Rosenstein did, but I know what McCabe or Page and Strzok did. They tried to destroy this president. If Rosenstein’s involved, he should be fired. If he’s not involved, leave him alone.’’

At the time of his firing, McCabe said the attacks against him were “part of this administration’s ongoing war on the FBI” that “only highlights the importance of the special counsel’s work” investigating whether the Trump campaign conspired with Russia.

Graham told Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday that a new special counsel is required to investigate what happened at the FBI, and he called on Rosenstein to appoint one immediately.

“Rosenstein is doing the country a disservice by not appointing a special counsel” to look into FBI actions regarding Trump and Russia, he said.

Democrats have resisted the call for another special counsel to be appointed and ridiculed claims by Trump and his allies that the FBI is tainted by bias.

“The President has claimed a vast conspiracy in his own government against his campaign and Administration,” Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said over the summer when a Justice Department inspector general’s report was released finding that former FBI director James B. Comey and others failed to follow rules. Durbin noted that “this report found no evidence that political bias affected the FBI’s investigations.” He and other Democrats have repeatedly said complaints of bias are misplaced and seem to be an effort to undermine the inquiry into the Trump campaign and Russia led by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III.

 

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https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/26/michael-avenatti-identifies-kavanaugh-accuser-as-julie-swetnick.html

So, new accuser comes forward detailing what exactly went on at those lovely high school parties. Drugging and rape. You'd think that this would convince them to not have a drugging, rapey guy appointed to the highest court in the land, but hey, I'm not counting on shit from these guys. I think there are some that want to vote against him, but they're all in such lockstep, it's disgusting. If only one republican would stand up and say NO, I'm not voting for this guy, others would follow. Since it seems like they're all sharing one spine between them, who has inherited it from McCain? Whoever you are - stand up, do the right thing.

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It isn't my senators. I've called to demand an explanation on why they will vote yes without a proper investigation and I just get the "we will let the Senator know you called" response. 

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4 hours ago, formergothardite said:

It isn't my senators. I've called to demand an explanation on why they will vote yes without a proper investigation and I just get the "we will let the Senator know you called" response. 

I've got John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, so I know how you feel. :text-protest:

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