(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .
Looking at GOP budget plans - Call it "the Raw Deal" from "the Anti-FDR" [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-01-30
The thing to keep in mind when Republicans say what they will do for you is that they always lie — unless you are a wealthy backer/buyer of the Greedy Oligarch’s Party.
No one in their right mind (other than the increasingly filthy rich) would vote for them and what they really want to do, so they lie, divert, scapegoat, promote conspiracy theories, and otherwise pull off their scams while filling their pockets. The Republican Party, as Kevin Drum summed it up, has but one purpose and one strategy.
..So this is where we are. The Republican Party can’t win using ordinary methods. On the process side, they can win only by inflating the white vote via gerrymandering, cracked-and-packed districts, and ruthless black voter suppression. On the policy side, they can win only with heavy dollops of strident and outright bigotry against Mexicans, Muslims, blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, and anyone else who comes along. Even Canadians will do in a pinch.
emphasis added — prophetic wasn’t it?
This is the following key paragraph:
emphasis added. This was written in 2018, but it’s how they’ve been operating for decades
I’m going to share a gift link to a NY Times article while I still have a subscription. Somebody got ahold of a GOP memo from the House Budget Committee, and it’s a revealing wish list.
208 policies that could become part of the congressional agenda this year.
A document being circulated by the House Budget Committee outlines an ambitious Republican agenda to lower taxes, roll back green energy initiatives, reduce federal spending on health care, trim the safety net and limit federal support for higher education. It contains more than 200 items, with a heavy emphasis on spending cuts that could help pay for extending tax cuts.
A few caveats, of course. Some of the things they want to do aren’t allowed without some legislative sleight of hand and other ploys. Some of them overlap, so it’s not a question of just adding up the cuts they want or the savings they claim. Some of them are not likely to get past disagreement within their own ranks. Some of it (most of it?) is only a wild-assed guess at how much things will cost or save. It remains to be seen how much help challenges in what’s left of the judicial system will be.
Nonetheless, look at the whole thing even if you only skim it. It gives an idea of the scope of GOP ambitions. This is why they talk about getting rid of DEI, pushing trans people out of the military, stage photo-op mass deportations, etc. It’s like a stage magician using diversion and misdirection to fool the audience from seeing through a trick.
What’s rather quaint about this is The NY Times is discussing this as though the House Republicans can be taken seriously. The power of the purse is being claimed by Donald Trump, Elon Musk and the rest of the Billionaire Boys Club. The wishes of the Heritage Foundation are the blueprint they are following, plus whatever whims, delusions, and obsessions Trump is holding — which can change at any moment.
The idea that House Republicans are going to be able to craft any kind of budget as might have happened in times past is about as likely as any of them developing a sense of shame. The reality is, in William Saletan’s phrase, “The GOP is a failed state. Donald Trump is officially its warlord.”
That doesn’t mean that what they want won’t happen. They have been working up to this for decades now and they won’t stop. The mistake is thinking that they can do this and still have a viable country afterwards — not that they care as long as they are on top of the rubble.
We’ve just had a terrible failure of the Air Traffic Control System. Republicans are already trying to blame it on DEI. There’s more than a little irony in the fact that the crash happened at the airport named for the President who fired all the air traffic controllers and destroyed their union.
And here we are.
Unlike Trump, FDR had an actual mandate and solutions that worked. If anything he didn’t go far enough — and he too had a hostile Supreme Court which he wasn’t afraid to confront. Compare and contrast with current Democratic timidity.
The press, too much of the Democratic Party establishment, and too many Americans still haven’t realized this — although, as per Dornbusch’s law, it’s happening too fast now to ignore or for the media to smooth over.
I have to give credit to the reporters who worked on Times article. It can’t have been fun wading through all of it. Too bad it isn’t going to be expanded into a daily series of articles with links on the front page detailing who and how it will hurt, or that this kind of coverage didn’t happen months ago. That would require a functioning press.
The Democratic Establishment still hasn’t gone on a war footing; messaging is contradictory and/or ineffective. There should be no Democrat votes for anything going through Congress, or any of Trump’s nominees.
Biden’s modesty and unwillingness/inablity to use the bully pulpit 24/7 left GOP messaging to dominate the mainstream media, which is wired for the right wing. It should be remembered that one of FDR’s gifts was being able to reach Americans with Fireside Chats.
On radio, he quelled rumors, countered conservative-dominated newspapers, and explained his policies directly to the American people. His tone and demeanor communicated self-assurance during times of despair and uncertainty. Roosevelt was regarded as an effective communicator on radio, and the fireside chats kept him in high public regard throughout his presidency. Their introduction was later described as a "revolutionary experiment with a nascent media platform."[1]
Granted it would be difficult for a Demcratic President to do the same think in the fractured media landscape of today, given the way the mainstream corporate press reflexively discounts Democratic achievements while parroting Republican talking points. Donald Trump has never stopped being able to monopolize media attention from 2015 on. (It doesn’t hurt that there's a vast right wing media machine to pump up the volume, not to mention foreign troll farms and bots.)
One of the hallmarks of fascism is a fixation on the idea that there was once some fabulous time to go back to. The problem is, the ‘Golden Age’ the filthy rich behind all this want is a return to the Gilded Age.
KEY TAKEAWAYS The Gilded Age lasted from the late 1800s to the early 1900s and was characterized by economic growth for the wealthy and extreme poverty for the working classes.
A societal shift from agriculture to industry resulted in a movement to the cities for some and westward migration for others.
The beginning of organized labor, investigative journalism, and progressive ideologies began to spell the end of the Gilded Age and its rigid class structure.
The Gilded Age marked the beginning of industrialization in America—a time of innovation, transportation growth, and full employment. It was also a time of economic devastation and dangerous working conditions for labor.
What goes around comes around. We’ve been here before. The cartoon below shows how the Grange movement worked to mobilize people against the abuses of the Gilded Age.
[END]
---
[1] Url:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/1/30/2299920/-Looking-at-GOP-budget-plans-Call-it-the-Raw-Deal-from-the-Anti-FDR?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=latest_community&pm_medium=web
Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.
via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/
