The GOP Chess Game
Throughout Donald Trump’s presidency commentators have sometimes
offered the checkers vs. chess analogy: is he somehow playing a long,
strategic game while most of us try to keep up, day-to-day, with his
abrupt, shifting moves, seemingly timed to capture or divert the news
cycle? After almost eleven months it is clear that Trump is no chess
master; he is a bit player. Rather, with the passage of its tax bill,
it is the Republican party that has boldly and unapologetically asserted
its master plan. Its so-called tax reform legislation certainly
redistributes wealth from the poor and lower and middle class Americans
to corporations and the rich, packaged in a promise of trickle down
benefits from top to bottom. But it is more than that. Our Republican
representatives have seized their long-sought opportunity to “starve the
beast,” a goal proudly announced as far back as the 1980s by David
Stockman, Reagan’s budget director. They pledge jet-fueled growth from
tax cuts, but their overarching goal is to spawn deficits and reduce
the federal government’s ability to fund an array of programs—most
specifically, what they label “entitlements.” Whose entitlements?
Yours. Your children’s
.
Watch the plan play out. Very soon we’ll see cuts in Medicare,
Medicaid, and other health-related programs, as they will be required by
“pay-as-you-go” Congressional rules. House Speaker Paul Ryan has
already announced his plans to attack the challenges of long term
spending for Social Security and Medicare. Responsible governing?
Check to see whose pockets have been picked, whose stuffed, before you
answer that question.
Publishing history
Herald Record 12/7
New Paltz Times 12/14
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