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GOP: Lies, Big Lies & Ploys to Win; Vote No to Anti-Democracy Republican Regime [1]
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Date: 2022-10-24
If Republicans regain control of Congress, they will repeal or reverse all the hard-won gains of the Biden Administration and Democrats including climate action, infrastructure investment, tax reform, while Republicans will institute national abortion ban, trickle-down economics, and extort cuts to Social Security and Medicare by refusing to raise the debt limit, which would crash the economy © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com
By Karen Rubin, News-Photos-Features.com
In our last column, I listed many of the actions that Democrats have taken to make our lives better – climate action, voting rights, women’s rights, record jobs creation and wages, infrastructure, sustainable economic revitalization, advancing public safety and criminal justice reform – towards a more equitable society and why I urge the election of Democrats throughout the ballot, as well as voting yes on the environmental bond.
NONE of these things would have happened if Republicans were in control, and ALL of these things will be reversed or repealed if Republicans get control of Congress and our state and local government.
Indeed, Republicans are using inflation, crime, and parental rights in public education as their go-to to ramp up anger, frustration and sense of suffering. But in the first place, they offer lies and hyperbole, ignore the facts that inflation is higher in 100 countries, is due to larger forces including COVID and supply chain issues, and Putin’s genocidal war in Ukraine.
But while Republicans revel in the problems, they offer no actual solutions (unless you consider cutting Medicare and Social Security, repealing Biden’s student debt relief, and massively increasing fossil fuel production solutions while voting, to inflation; massively promoting access to guns including weapons of war as a solution to crime; and banning books in schools and libraries that a minority of parents are demanding over the wishes of others, and overturning school and public health requirements for vaccinations an adequate answer to “parental rights”). They even refuse to allocate funding for COVID prevention or to bolster the nation against a new epidemic.
In fact, Republicans also are actively working to obstruct solutions to ease suffering: voting against prosecuting price gouging at the pump or grocery store amid record profits; voting against sending aid for mental health to schools and communities; voting against voting rights, civil rights, immigration reform, gun safety, even disaster aid. The so-called “law and order” party even threaten to defund the FBI and have threatened to defund police in sanctuary cities.
What is the Republican agenda – to the extent they have admitted to it – if they take control of Congress and our state government?
They will ban abortion nationwide, rendering women second-class citizens without the same autonomy, self-determination, and ability to forge their own future or even save their own life, as the men who impregnate them have. A Republican just introduced a bill outlawing contraception and another
Under the guise of “parental rights” Republicans advocate book banning and curriculum censorship, overturning public health requirements like vaccinations. A Republican in Congress introduced a national “Don’t Say Gay” bill that would enable defunding schools and libraries.
“Parental rights are supreme,” said Vibhuti N. Jha, Republican challenging Gina Silletti for New York State Assembly. As for abortion, he casually said without any relevance to fact, “86 percent of abortions are for casual reasons.”
They will repeal the Affordable Health Care Act – for the 71st time – and repeal the hard-won ability of Medicare to negotiate drug prices, cap out-of-pocket drug costs for Medicare recipients at $2000, and repeal the cap on the price of insulin (which costs $10 to make) at $35, instead of as much as $600.
If Republicans take over Congress, they have made clear they intend to crash the US and global economy by threatening the full faith and credit of the US unless Democrats yield to their demand to cut Social Security and Medicare. said they will use threat of refusing to raise the debt ceiling – crashing US credit rating, economic stability, and the world economy – in order to extort cuts to Medicare, Social Security (they’ve done it before). They have already shut down government to extort repeal of Obamacare; Trump, as president, did the unthinkable thing and shut down government himself to extort funding for his border wall that he had promised Mexico would pay for.
And yet, Biden’s economic policies have resulted in a record $1.4 trillion REDUCTION in the budget deficit, while producing a RECORD 10 million new jobs and wage increases that impact people's well-being for a lifetime; inflation is transitory.
Instead, Republicans intend to expand the 2017 tax cuts that only benefited the wealthiest 0.1% and corporations and added $2 TRILLION to the national debt (the same thing that caused Britain’s currency to collapse and the government to fall), while repealing Biden’s 15 percent minimum tax on the wealthiest corporations (55 of them made $400 billion in profit and paid zero tax) which Biden successfully negotiated globally. They plan to cut to Social Security and Medicare, even extending the age for eligibility to 75, and require reauthorization every 5 years or even annually.
Trump economic advisor Larry Kudlow cheered Britain’s supply side (“trickle down”) economic policies, which he said “looks a lot like [Kevin] McCarthy’s Commitment to America - slashing tax rates [for the wealthy], deregulating energy - love it, love it.” That prompted an immediate economic crash in Britain and the collapse of Liz Truss’ brief rule as Prime Minister. McCarthy thinks the MAGA Republicans will elect him Speaker of the House because he has done such a wonderful job of kowtowing to Trump.
What Republicans refuse to do, though, is repeal the cap on SALT (State and Local Tax) deductions, to $10,000, which was aimed at hurting Blue States including New York and California. Their tax policies also raised taxes on those earning less than $75,000, while Biden’s child tax credit lifted half of impoverished children out of poverty, and his new tax policy will not raise taxes on anyone earning less than $400,000 a year.
Republicans will reverse Biden’s all-of-government press for climate action – mitigating against the ravages of climate change that is costing Americans more than $100 billion a year, by furthering the transition to clean, renewable energy economy, which itself is spurring millions of new jobs (here on Long island, there is a new off-shore wind energy industry emerging, as well as installing EV chargers to facilitate the transition to electric cars) – in favor of deadly fossil fuel production and transmission. Lee Zeldin, who seeks to oust Kathy Hochul, has said so; his response to gas prices? Drill more, frack more, put pipelines through New York State.
Indeed, New Yorkers should vote yes on the $4.2 billion Environmental Bond Act – which wouldn’t even be proposed with Republicans in power.
“Climate is a cycle - we’ve gone through numerous ice ages and come back as a planet - that’s a fact” George Santos, the Republican running against Democrat Robert Zimmerman for Congress (3rd) said. “We need to end the war on producing energy in the US - that is the cause of inflation, that is what is leading to recession,” showing his ignorance that gasoline prices are set on a world market despite his claim to be an “economist” and a self-employed “financial investor.”
Republicans blocked legislation to address price gouging, while Biden is spending record investment in clean, renewable energy that would truly make the US independent and yield sustainable economic growth.
Meanwhile, Santos would be a vote for Kevin McCarthy refusing to provide additional aid to Ukraine.
Republicans love to gin up fear over crime and masquerade as the party of “law and order” (two words: January Sixth). Crime is going up everywhere - in places ruled by Republicans (In Nassau County, once considered the safest county of its size in the country, crime is up 34 percent so far this year) as well as Democrats, places that have implemented bail reform and those that haven’t, places that have taken police reform and criminal justice seriously and those that haven’t, but while car thefts are inconvenient, gun violence and hate crimes and political violence that surged with Trump and Trumpism, take a permanent toll.
Gun deaths set an all-time record of 45,000 in 2021, a number that has spiked since Trump and Trumpism along with easy access to guns, and has increased from 34,000 pre-Trump – hate crimes and domestic violence, which are now being prosecuted in earnest because we’ve had Democratic governors who prioritize these crimes and growing use of political violence and intimidation. Can you imagine Lee Zeldin prosecuting domestic violence or for that matter hate crimes the way Governor Kathy Hochul has?
And while year-over-year percentage increases are misleading, the per capita murder rates are more reflective of actual reality, and are 40% higher in states won by Trump than in those won by Joe Biden. In fact, some of the highest murder rates are in Republican-led cities: Jacksonville A(19.78 per 100K), Tulsa (19.64), Fresno (14.09), Bakersfield (11.91), Oklahoma city (11.16) and Lexington (10.61), compared to NYC (5.94) and Los Angeles (6.74). Texas rate of gun deaths is 67 percent higher than California’s.
What about crime rates? New York ranks 41st in violent crime (3185) compared to Oklahoma which ranks 6th (5870); non-violent crime NY is again 41st (2821) compared to Oklahoma (6th, with 5411).
What have Republicans offered to combat crime? Republicans are trying to roll back any state or locality’s ability to implement reasonable, rational gun safety, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman included. And Republican governors including Ron DeSantis, Brian Kemp and Greg Abbott have EXPANDED access to guns. In fact, instead of raising the age to 21 for someone to LEGALLY purchase an assault gun, Abbott is sending DNA kits to parents so they can identify their children after a massacre such as Uvalde. Notably, the number of Texans shot or wounded doubled since Abbott signed permitless carry into law. Is that what Zeldin and Blakeman want for New York?
When asked where the data is that would support allowing guns in synagogues, churches, schools and on public transit would increase safety, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, who is seeking to overturn New York’s new gun safety legislation, had no response.
Republicans like to excuse their refusal to vote for gun safety legislation to address the American epidemic of gun massacres as being caused by mental illness rather than the easy access to weapons of war, but then vote AGAINST funding for mental health in communities and schools (Democrats are funding an expansion of Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinics anyway, because they have the majority).
Republicans also refuse to provide funding to continue to protect the public against COVID or to fight the next pandemic. COVID has killed one million, and tens of millions more were sickened with many experiencing long-COVID.
Republicans attack Democrats using the meme “defund the police,” but it is the Republicans who are calling for defunding law enforcement they don’t like – Trump wanted to end funding to any sanctuary city and the Republican Sedition Caucus is calling for defunding the FBI. Imagine. But Biden and Democrats have increased funding for community policing and public safety initiatives.
What else are they wanting to defund? Republicans are really, really upset about the prospect of hiring IRS agents to collect the $1 trillion A YEAR unpaid by the wealthiest, raising the specter of agents raiding middle class homes with guns drawn.
Voting rights? Using the Big Lie as an excuse, Republicans around the country are abusing their power to suppress voting, intimidate voters and election officials (DeSantis just arrested 20 people for the crime of voting after they were registered but not the people who maliciously voted twice for Trump), make access to the ballot box harder, and subvert elections altogether.
Jack Martins who torpedoed New York’s first Independent Redistricting Commission and is now trying to regain his State Senate seat from Democrat Anna Kaplan, said he supports a suit overturning New York’s law allowing those afraid of contracting COVID to vote by absentee ballot, saying it’s just that he wants only eligible voters to vote. How does protecting yourself from a deadly disease render your eligibility in question? There is absentee voting, but New York’s is much more restrictive than most other states, resulting in exceptionally low turnout (that benefits Republicans, and he knows it); one of the reasons turnout was so strong in 2020 (besides hatred for Trump who lost by 7 million votes amid record turnout) was that states all eased access to the ballot, the way it should be.
Here’s another deep concern: it’s not just who is elected, but who they hire, appoint to actually do the work of governing. Republicans have demonstrated they will install cronies, patsies, lackies and outright crooks, while Democrats have shown they will appoint competent, expert, dedicated public servants. If someone is found to have committed misdeeds, Democrats remove them (Brian Benjamin), unlike Republicans who rally in support (Ryan Zinke, Tom Price, Scott Pruitt, Alex Acosta, Hershel Walker, Matt Gaetz, Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon).
Besides reversing or repealing every positive action taken by Democrats (when they aren’t also taking credit), the Republicans intend to spend their time in power impeaching Biden, Harris, the January 6 committee members and every cabinet member, investigating (actual witch hunts, like for Benghazi), but not actually governing. Because they don’t actually have any ideas or care about improving lives of average Americans.
Democracy is on the ballot.
Vote Democrat.
Plan your vote: information at www.vote.org.
See also: Elect Democrats
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