How the Trump/GOP con will work out for middle class

Now we have a media campaign to sell the tax cut by the GOP from which 80 percent of the benefits go to the top 10 percent. It is funded by $20 million from the Koch brothers who gave House Speaker Paul Ryan $500,000 one week after the cut.

Last November, Sen. Lindsey Graham said “financial contributions will stop” if we don’t pass a tax cut. The GOP obediently got around to the tax cut “for the middle class.” But in reality it is the Rich Donor Class Relief Act for the top 10 percent and corporations.

Corporations are gaining headlines with “bonuses” (one time) and scattered salary increases totaling $6 billion, to date. Now stock buybacks estimated at $800 billion by year’s end are in full swing. This benefits shareholders and corporations, not the middle class.

The GOP/Tea Party/Mark Sanford fiscal hawks who screamed about deficits in 2011, when we needed the economic stimulus, were silent on the deficit increase and all voted for the tax cut.

Now, the “new budget” increases the deficit by $1.1 trillion and we hear the fiscal hawks scream about deficits again. To what end? These are the two “bait” pieces of the con. The switch is coming.

Anything that reduces revenue (tax cuts) must be paid for with tax increases or spending cuts. Medicare and Social Security, which we paid into for 50 years, will be the GOP cuts. So, the GOP ignores worsening debt, then claims the need for “entitlement reforms.” It’s the Trump/GOP con.

This story was originally published April 7, 2018 at 6:00 AM with the headline "How the Trump/GOP con will work out for middle class."