The Republican Solution To Everything: Spending Cuts, Tax Cuts, or Both

The United States of America is the wealthiest nation on the planet, but somehow we can’t find a way to fund important government programs that help lift people out of poverty and build a stronger foundation for our future. We have an entire political coalition that wants to cut taxes even further while attempting to make government so small it can fit in our bedrooms — right before they drown it in the bathtub (to paraphrase both The West Wing and tax pledge prophet Grover Norquist).

Here’s how Republicans plan to deal with the challenges this country faces:

Poverty? — Cut government assistance including food stamps.

High unemployment? — Cut unemployment insurance benefits and tell people to get off their asses and get a non-existent job.

Jobs? — More tax cuts for the “job creators” because they are doing such a great job with the “Bush tax cuts.”

Medicare? — Don’t try to solve it, just end the program entirely. Give your 85-year-old granny a coupon and tell her to buy a private insurance plan.

Social Security? — First, you need to lie to people and tell them that Social Security is heading towards insolvency (it isn’t) and that it’s adding to the federal debt (it’s not). Second, try to kill it just like Medicare. Privatize it and give Wall Street the job of guarding the country’s safety net for senior citizens.

Education? — We don’t need to spend more money, we need to break the teachers’ union. We also don’t need to pay teachers more, we need to use that money instead to pay for tax breaks for people like Mitt Romney — because he’s a “job creator” and he will create jobs for all the future under-educated Americans.

Inner-city crime? — Don’t hire more police, just fire the entire force and outsource it to the county or state. Besides, they aren’t our constituency anyway.

Politics

#crime#education#jobs#medicare#poverty#Republican#social security#spending#spending cuts#starve the beast#tax cuts