i really do appreciate feedback!!

what joy

As you could tell when I hit send half an hour ago, I am not feeling warm and fuzzy about the state of our nation today. Two loyal readers and long-time friends immediately came back to challenge me.

I want you to hear their comments, then my responses. Part of the reason I implore you to comment is none of us—NONE OF US—have all the answers in such a complicated world. You help me think things through as I hope I help you.

The first was a reader saying he agrees the House is currently in bad shape but he is so much more concerned about the growing deficit. In the time since he wrote that, a New York Times story came across the screen that the federal deficit was not $1 trillion this year but $1.7 trillion. As the late Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen said more than half a century ago, ‘a million here, a million there eventually becomes real money’.

We are well into real money and both parties have wallowed there for quite a while. And that is my point: the alleged fiscal conservatives have a clear track record of INCREASING THE DEFICIT. Let me say that again, Matt Gaetz and some of the Chaos Caucus raised the deficit by doing nothing when Donald Trump slashed taxes for the wealthy and spent like crazy when it suited him.

That is public information, not a partisan slap. The people who claim to care about the deficit had a chance to rein in Trump’s spending, at least, but enabled him instead. One of the reasons Republicans were worried about Jordan was how he would handle spending, not just answering the deficit question. Funny how politicians find these curious programs they must must must support when they are in power.

What the supposed ‘deficit hawks’ want is to use the political cudgel of the ‘Biden’ deficit to attack what are incorrectly seen as ‘democratic’ programs. These are in fact national programs about which too many Republican voters seem ignorant when they benefit from them. The voters on both sides of the aisle would be horrified to lose the variety of assistance government provides just as they were when the Affordable Care Act took root as their medical lifelines. So, let’s stop being stupid about this.

Besides to cut the deficit, we have to go after everything across the board. That would include defense, Medicare, Social Security, and the entire enchilada. The discretionary spending isn’t sufficient.

Additionally, if they wanted to address the deficit, we could raise taxes. Don’t shoot me but we have taken an entire option off permanently, it seems.

This is deficit discussion is pure theater for people who are either ignorant of how the deficit accumulates or so fundamentally hypocritical as to be laughable.

Serving in a office means one has a track record. The track record is not merely under a president you seek to unseat; it is your track record under all presidents and Speakers and everything else.

The second comment came from a reader reminding me she does not vote for these clowns. No, she definitely does not but we as a society most definitely do. The merely 20 or so competitive House seats at any time means we are all returning our Members without much thought. Once any elected official gets past the initial re-election campaign, it’s generally smooth sailing for Members of the House and Senate for as long as they want to stay.

So, no, any one of us might not vote for a specific figure in the performances of this past three weeks but we are not, as a society, turning over Members all that often.

Alexandria Ocasio Cortez will, I assume, run for reelection in 2024 when she will, if successful, enter her eighth term. When Jim Jordan won his first election in 2006 along with Kevin McCarthy, they were youngsters but they have now each served for 17 years. Reports mentioned that Jordan has never sponsored a single bill that passed into legislation. I suspect there are others in the same position but I am not familiar with all 435 of their records, I confess. I don’t know about Ocasio-Cortez’s sponsorship record, I admit. My point, however, is the same: we keep electing our representatives for the most part.

No, I don’t blame my friend or take the blame myself for the 435 Members but we are a collective society rather than merely individuals following a certain behaviour.

What did I say to pique your thoughts?? Thank you so much to those who responded. This is the discussion I so desperately want us to have so we think about what we’re doing rather than making assumptions that need reconsideration.

Be well and be safe. FIN

Alan Rappeport and Jim Tankersley, ‘Treasury Report Shows $1.7 Trillion Deficit’, nytimes.com, 20 October 2023, retrieved at https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/20/business/treasury-report-shows-1-7-trillion-deficit.html