As we approach a new year, and a presidential election, one of the center pieces of the Trump campaign will be the successful booming economy. This is indeed a noteworthy occurrence, but unfortunately Republicans had to sell their souls in supporting this achievement because it was accomplished at the expense of raising our national debt.
As long as I can remember Democrats were branded by Republicans as the spend, spend, spend, party. Republicans continually lambasted Democrats for what they termed was “fiscal irresponsibility” which continually led to escalation of the national debt. This was most recently readily apparent during the Obama years. Republicans prided themselves as the fiscally responsible party guarding the fiscal wellbeing of our nation, vowing to lower our national debt.
Well it’s interesting to note that, thanks to President Trump, Republicans are now totally in tune with Democrats when it comes to, what they termed, “fiscal irresponsibility.” The Trump administration has now exceeded the Obama administration in terms of the size of the national debt and is on course to be the proud sponsor of highest debt in the history of our nation.
Contributing to this momentous accomplishment has been Trump’s bailout of the soybean farmers which was necessitated by his tariff war with China. As a matter of fact this bailout will now exceed the auto industry bailout during the Obama administration which was so vehemently ridiculed at the time by Trump and his fellow Republicans as a “waste of tax payers’ dollars.” Trump even vowed that no such bailout would have occurred if he was the president.
President Trump also just signed wage increases for Federal Workers, coupled with one year paid maternity leave, after lamenting in 2017 that they deserved no such raise or benefits because it was to quote fellow Republicans “a waste of taxpayers’ money,” and “fiscally irresponsible.”
Another point of Republican
soul sellout is the recently negotiated North American Free trade Agreement
with Mexico and Canada. The previous agreement was relentlessly
ridiculed by President Trump and Republicans as the “worst trade deal ever”
when Trump was running for office. He promised to rip it up and start
over with a totally new agreement if he was elected.
But instead of
tearing the agreement to shreds, Trump mostly just patched it up.
The new US-
Mexico-Canada Agreement, known as the USMCA, that is supposed
to replace NAFTA, is in many ways similar to its quarter-century-old
predecessor. In fact 60% is actually the same. It is almost exactly what
Democrats proposed and was again a sign that Republican ideology, as espoused by Trump, was now
totally in step with their arch-rivals regarding
this accomplishment.
It is interesting
to note that while some of our fellow Republicans fill the airways with
messages about how the Democrats have lost their way and question just what
they now stand for, the Republicans are no better. Republicans, like
Democrats, are so immersed in power struggles that they have lost the values that have defined them for years.
Maybe this is a
good thing, but it is certainly worth noting that individuals chose the
Republican Party based upon what they thought was in tune with their
beliefs. However, it is obvious that the Republican Party can no longer
be defined by its past ideologies.
Trumps supporters
need to stop referring to themselves as Republicans and instead face the
reality that they are now members of a third party known as Trumpians.
Now if only Steve
Scalise, John Kennedy, Bill Cassidy and Mitch McConnell would face the reality
and acknowledge that, they’d sleep better at night.
