From another planet you can see what is really going on. China owns the USA economically. Everything we buy now is from them. Russia owns the USA politically. They now control the Presidency and both houses of Congress.
So what do we see? Looks like China and Russia are both maneuvering to see who gets to carve up the carcass of the former United States of America and make soup. All that American culture, who will walk off with it as their trophy?
3
Before the Great Depression the GOP passed similar legislation. My grandparents and parents suffered the effects of it...I'm in my 60s it horrifies me that my children and grandchildren could suffer the same fate. We found a better way. The GOP is willing to throw it out...We must not let this stand.
3
The GOP only have to worry about voters if elections remain fair, and I don't know why that should happen when they haven't been honest about anything else.
12
It's embarrassing to have to pose elementary questions, but I suppose we also serve who only stand and ask.
To what extent will Democratic majorities in Congress be able to undo the Republican tax scheme and spending cuts, and how long might some of the undoing take? For example, an entire program or agency that had been eliminated could not spring back to life at once. I know nothing about the lives of tax codes.
A Supreme Court justice is forever, but what should I understand about the budget?
4
They're going to kill us and never look back with a care in the world. That's the Republican party of today. A fight is coming and you all better be ready to step up or you'll have no one to blame but yourself. No excuses.
17
You may be absolutely sure that the axe aimed against programs of the Great Society and the New Deal will spare welfare that enriches rich Republican donors.
13
I am surprised at the number of posts pillorying the proposed cuts to Medicare. These are the same people who were cheering Obamacare on in spite of the fact that it cuts Medicare by $716 Billion in an effort to remain deficit neutral. I fact according to the CBO if these cuts were enacted 50 % of hospitals, 60% of skilled nursing homes and 90% of Home health agencies would be losing money and would either go out of business or stop taking Medicare.
3
As a caregiver for an 84-year old mother with Alzheimers disease and a sibling confined to a wheelchair, the prospect of Medicare and Social Security being cut frightens me. The cost of care would wipe us out without assistance. Is that what Paul Ryan and Republicans want?
The meager tax break promised to middle-cut folks like me isn't going to help me pay for my mother and sister's care. Heck, it won't pay much of anything. Those tax breaks promised by the Senate and House are designed to rip off the "little" people like me and give a windfall to the fat cats on Wall Street. Of course, Paul Ryan and the rest of the Republicans on Capitol Hill (and let's not forget the Trump) know that already. But yeah, let's cut services to the people who need them the most.
10
Tax cuts or not, what most commenters are missing is that something has to be done regarding the so called entitlement programs.
1
Yes, for Social Security we need to lift the cap on the income subject to the specially dedicated Social Security tax and impose a Social Security tax on capital gain income over a certain annual level. The Social Security tax should apply to all earned income, including things like stock oltions and so-called carried interest. There are all kinds of ways to find additional funds for Medicare/Medicaid. One idea is to impose a transaction tax on the buying and selling of stocks and bonds.
19
Sickening. Today’s Republican Party isn’t fit to govern. I look forward to voting for Democrats in 2018 and 2020 and hope that all Americans will do the same.
13
Can we make that a unanimous vote by acclamation?
6
Many of my neighbors voted for Trump and other Republicans. Now they will get a very nasty surprise when their Medicare and social security benefits are cut. They already don't understand why their children can't get health insurance (Medicaid); they blame Obama for poorly designing "Obamacare," not understanding that the original form of the ACA included a Medicaid expansion that was then nixed by our state legislature (bought by the Koch brothers). I think they will find some way to excuse Trump and again blame Democrats, or Hillary, or Obama. Anybody but Trump and the Republicans.
15
They'll probably rationalize it somehow. I'm reminded of the old Monty Pyrhon mockumentary about the Piranha Brothers (read Koch?), criminals who terrorized London with a combination of violence and sarcasm. In one scene, the narrator interviews a victim who has had his head nailed to the floor. He excused the Brothers, saying, "They had to do it. There was nothing else they could do, to be fair. I had violated the unwritten law."
8
I intend to get involved with AARP political action.
8
Stop Calling Social Security an Entitlement! Look at everyone's payroll and see our SS deduction from our paychecks. The only entitlements that I see are the ones that each member of Congress enjoys, High Salaries, Health Care and a Retirement Benefit for Life.
The republicans especially Ryan and McConnell are reprehensible! Corporate Donor interests only, not the American worker.
20
Exactly. We should call Social Security and Medicare EARNED benefits. We paid into them our entire lives, and we earned those benefits.
12
If it is true that cuts to social security and Medicaid are to compensate for cuts to corporations and the rich, I don't know how any civilised person could agree with that tax bill.
12
As a CPA, It is time to tax 100% of all wages and self employment income under Social Security and Medicare! If companies and individuals can earn exorbitant amounts, they can afford to pay the additional tax.
17
Let's pause and think about what is really motivating the Republican Party.
They are a doomsday cult. They believe the future is a dark place. The world and the economy are zero-sum games. Their tax cut bill says, "Better grab yours, while the getting is good - before the bottom falls out." Everything is transactional. Retreat to your fortress bunker with your guns and canned good and gold, because the end is nigh. Donald Trump is the opiate of the masses (for those not addicted to actual opioids). And, like Jim Jones, he is happy to serve the Kool-Aid.
Don't believe me? Think I am exaggerating? Go back and read Donald Trump's "American carnage" inaugural address.
- https://www.whitehouse.gov/inaugural-address
Somehow 38% of Americans live in this alternate reality. Meanwhile, I remain an American optimist. We must - and will - get past this.
Resist. And vote!
16
I think the Republicans are motivated by a simple quid pro quo arrangement with the rich and big business.
7
Are the commenting really so disingenuous as to perpetuate the democrat lie that Social Security and Medicare are entitlements? In the context of political truth what entitlement means is something you get for nothing when you have not paid for it with work or treasure free food, free cell Phones, free housing, free medical care, free education for those that are not willing to work or are illegally in our country. If it is given of their own choosing to the legitimately needy, by the people, it is called charity if by the government it is called buying votes. In either case it is not free to the giver and should have some shame attached when stolen or overused.
3
Thanks Republican Congress for increasingly rare annual tax bill by 6K-12K, then in 2018 cutting the social security/federal pensions we use to pay the increased tax bill. Don't know where we'll get the money to pay our dramatically increased medical bills after you gut Medicare. Hemlock, anyone?
5
G.O.P. = gospel of prosperity
MAGA = Modern American Gilded Age
- replete with our own contemporary robber barons
We have the best government that money can buy.
10
How do we get people to look past religion (which shouldn't be part of our electoral process) and vote for things that will benefit our country? I'm sick of people spouting how religious they are and that god will judge that they are willing to elect sexual predators to our highest offices and allow those people to decide policy for our great county, it's sickening and I for one am so tired of your religious beliefs and 2nd amendment right trumping the rights of EVERYONE else. While I want to be compassionate and help raise up those people that feel left behind I struggle, why should I help them when they can't even elect people that serve their interests, only their religion and guns. I guess this is how republican are made...fed up with it all! Reap what you sow red states.
6
So this is how Democracy ends. Not with a bang but a whimper. No raging in the street. Just whining from a smartphone. Sad. Pathetic even.
9
So let's hear the long list of what you're doing about it...
3
Have to start somewhere and comment here is a step forward. Its maddening to have been outmaneuvered by the republicans, but its really disappointing to see people take this moment to feel superior. What matters is how this theft of democracy was pulled off and to figure a way to undo it. Please spend your judgmental coupons on unseating republicans.
6
For starters:
Voting Democrat in every election I possibly can. From local to National. If no Dems available then Independent. Never Republican.
3
America got suckered by Trump and the GOP. They never had the middle class, the seniors, children, real health care, Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid in mind. They are nothing but stooges for the rich, banks, big oil, the insurance and big pharma, corporations, and Wall Street. Not only are they giving them huge welfare checks in this bogus tax bill, they are removing all regulations so that they can spend money like drunken sailors on shore leave. As for those small minds in those red and poor states, get ready for the misery you will get from these folks. You don't matter to them, you're just tools and fools for them to use and con. Congratulations, you have played your part like they expected...fools.
21
They're stuffing their pockets, grinning their shameless piggy smiles right into the camera. Please, if you don't make at least $100,000 a year, stand up and vote against the destruction of your financial security. Trump's personal tie collection is probably worth about the same as our retirement accounts.
This really is the wealthy taking more money from the less well-off, and us letting them do it. This is greedy and unfair. And of course it will eventually tank our economy.
16
The Republicans should install a gold-plated replica of Grover Norquist's claw foot bathtub in the Capitol Rotunda. That is the altar at which they worship.
Starve the government of revenues, and then cry poor that "we can't afford that." Shrink the government to size that it can be "drowned in a bathtub." Take us back to 1925, or better yet 1880.
Taxes have come down steadily for 35 years. Today, the economy is doing fine. Corporate profits are at record highs. Unemployment is down to 4.1%. Meanwhile, the national debt doubled under each of the previous two presidents. And the national debt was already projected to rise by $10 trillion over the next decade under the old tax code, before the additional $1.5 trillion shortfall from the new Republican tax cut boondoggle. The G.O.P. has lost all credibility regarding fiscal responsibility.
It is not raining today. It is time to pay our bills. Why are even talking about tax cuts today?
10
They apparently want to roll back and revoke most of the last eighty years of improved lives for the vast majority of ordinary people. And many people will accept it, as long as it allows them to enforce on everyone else their "traditional values" -- values which here need no explication. "Judge" Roy Moore from Alabama (the same state as our current Attorney General) is an outstanding representative of those values.
I'm very happy to be living in a north-European Social Democracy, a country which realizes we're in the 21st century, not the 19th.
13
Please stop calling Social Security and other much-needed services "entitlements". It only feeds into the robber-barons' narrative.
14
- Mitch McConnell said that he believes the tax cuts will generate enough economic growth to pay for themselves through increased tax revenue (despite the overwhelming consensus of economists to the contrary).
- Paul Ryan, Marco Rubio, and others acknowledge that they are blowing a hole in the deficit, in order to justify future cuts to social safety net programs.
Which one is it? You can't have it both ways.
Hypocrites.
14
Obviously, McConnell is too smart to believe that nonsense.
2
I guess we have to suffer through another great recession or depression when this pyramid scheme fails, and then, if we're not all beholden to Chinese banks, we can turn the pendulum way back and tax these folks 90% to make up for the destruction they've caused. Young and old better vote their interest next time, and not listen to the siren call of white resentment. The wealthy, who are laughing up their sleeves at the dumb bumpkins who sold out their children's future and their own healthcare and care in old age for the lowest sort of propaganda, are do doubt thanking their version of Christ the money lender this Sunday . As for taking away worker's protections, i.e. social security and medicare, funds that they have paid their hard-earned money into for years, why don't the majority of the people, in a separate referendum, get to vote the way shareholders get to vote? Who gave the Repulsive Party the right to rob our money to pay off their donors? As for Trump, every word out of his mouth is a lie.
10
It has just occurred to me that I hope republicans make major cuts to social security and Medicare in 2018 so all of these boomers who voted for these guys suffer the consequences of their actions, and once they are gone we can stabilize the program and build it back up for generations like mine who weren’t so greedy and short sighted.
2
A lot of us boomers vote against these jokers. Stop playing into their game of turning one group against another (and being self-righteous).
10
What are Ron Paul and the other "fiscal conservatives" saying about this budget buster? What cuts are they proposing for the military, as they gut the underbelly of the middle class to enrich themselves further?
5
Republicans love to talk about entitlements and deficits, but nobody speaks out bluntly and honestly about the end effect of their policies: reducing the quality and length of life for the elderly, the poor, and the health-challenged -- in order to fix the deficit caused by tax reductions for the rich. Any good ad man could make this shorter and punchier.
Another suggestion: Put taxes back. Make America great again.
7
What nobody talks about is the political slobs that stole $10,000,000,000 between 2009 and 2017 while trying to destroy our infrastructure, borders, working class wages and justice system.
3
The national debt doubled under each of the last two presidents.
3
Something worthwhile for Trump to think about: As soon as he signs this bill he will have outlived his usefulness to the republicans.
15
Every comment is a voice of enragement against this horrid reality, but I don't see any urging us to do anything about it.
We are in this mess because WE have been too complacent and uninvolved. Instead of decrying, over and over, what is happening, start coming up with solutions. Go to D.C. If you can, and protest with the clergy. Get arrested with them. There is only strength in numbers.
6
What scares liberals the most is if this tax reform works. By providing incentives to deploy capital in the USA and making our Corporate tax rates competitive globally this tax reform is a growth machine. The question is, how much better will the middle class be in Republican states because of this reform? The answer is probably a lot in 2 plus years. That means 4 more years of Trump and 6 more years of Republican majorities in Congress. Yep, worry.
3
Bill, I am not "scared" that this tax reform will work - if you define "work" as meaning grow the economy significantly, and generate sufficient additional tax revenue to offset the $1.5 in additional deficits.
This bill is nothing but rehashed trickle-down economics, and an attempt to starve the federal government so it is small enough to fit in Grover Norquist's claw foot bathtub.
Companies are reporting record profits, profit margins, and have access to cheap money at record low interest rates. They are not investing in growth today because demand is not growing. Demand is not growing because wages are stagnant. Other factors include demographics and high household debt.
If we want more economic growth, what we need today is wage inflation. Demand-side economics.
Companies will return their tax savings to shareholders through buybacks, dividends, and they will also pay executives more. They have said so, including to Gary Cohn.
We are closer to the end than the beginning of the current business cycle. Unemployment is down to 4.1%. The 10-2 Treasury yield curve is down to 60 basis point, and may invert as soon as next year. This pro-cyclical tax cut plan is being done at the exact wrong time - and will do nothing but blow a bubble in stocks (and some malinvestment), exacerbating a boom-bust cycle. It will accelerate and worsen the next recession.
12
Not to worry. It won't work. It has never worked. It is designed to fool people, not to work.
7
I felt sick when I read the news of this vote. I will never understand why Republicans hate middle and lower class Americans so much. I contacted Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts, hoping they would show some common sense. They didn't. I also e-mailed Kansas Rep. Ron Estes. He's never had any common sense, nor does he pay any attention to his constituents. Everyone of these men need to go.
7
Because the middle and working classes don't contribute millions to their campaign coffers or give them and their families cushy jobs after "public service."It's strictly a legalized quid pro quo.
10
Do people of middle, modest, and scarce means understand what's going on? The whole point of taxation is to provide money for infrastructure and services that serve ALL the people, not just the few. To offer big tax breaks to the ultra-wealthy while sweating the rest of us for the money to do so undercuts the whole justification for taxing citizens.
Taxation without representation is just cause for war. But a bloodless war may be possible. Question: What if Americans who are NOT among those benefiting from this ridiculous tax bill banded together in enormous numbers to cut the flow of money off at the teat? What if a popular movement arose by which those not among the 1% or 2% refuse to pay federal taxes? Numbers are important here. A small number of people doing so will be ineffective. But what if we're talking about millions upon millions of people who simply don't pay their federal income taxes on principle? How is the IRS going to keep up with that many people?
Let the rich pay taxes, and let their money be distributed among themselves. I live in an area with few services already, and we stand to lose what paltry government support now exists (in my case, Social Security that I paid into for 35 years). Why should we continue to pay? If everything is to be taken away from us, why not boycott the laws negotiated behind closed doors without our representation? We're being destroyed anyway. Why not protest loudly in the meantime? (And money screams.)
9
During the crash of 2007-2008 Imagine if Trump became president, instead of Obama.
Look at pictures of the "Great" depression.
Folks in the street, no jobs. The wealthy had all the money, enjoying the big meals in warm mansions while the rest of America, homeless and freezing prayed that the soup kitchen would open, begging to survive. Many trying to sell apples on the street.
When he came on the air, Rush Limbaugh repeatedly played the record "Ain't Got No Home" while he mocked the homeless. The cruel ugliness of these Vultures makes up the "No Heart, Right Wing Conservative".
The Twilight Zone episode, "To Serve Man", showed how a word could mislead the faithful.
"Great" on Trump's hat, misleads his cult.
By "Great Again", Trump and the Right Wing Conservatives mean....
No Social Security, No Medicare, No Medicaid.
Yes, America was once like this. Think "Great Depression"
If Trump and the Right Wing succeed in finally stealing our safety nets, I have One Word for you when things go bad again. "Applecart".
9
Some years ago, when China began to "rise" and adopted some free market/capitalist policies within their autocratic system, the conventional wisdom was that, with time, the rising economic fortunes of that country would lead it to emulate the US and other western countries and become a democracy. Instead, we have decided to emulate China and become a free market/capitalist country within an autocratic, oligarchical political system. Economic power and GDP growth have become the be-all and end-all. When democratic values, such as one person, one vote, get in the way, they are undermined by tactics such as voter suppression and gerrymandering. When a free press is seen as a threat to those in power it is undermined with blatant falsehoods. China has indeed won this competition and will continue to rise as we become a divided, rudderless country, devoid of values, and lost in the darkness of fear and greed.
5
This was the end game all along. Republicans hate Social Security and Medicare even more than they despise the Civil Rights and the Voting Acts. Medicare? Don't get them started. SCHIP was a test run. Unless you're low income with children, you probably missed it's demise, and you may not care. Don't like/need Medicare or Social Security? Then what's going to happen next won't bother you either. The "tax reform" deal lays the groundwork for cuts and the ultimate destruction of both programs. The party of borrow and spend is coming to take your safety net to pay for these huge and unsustainable deficits that nobody saw coming. But all will not be lost. They won't leave you sick and disgusted. "Here's your $4000 tax credit, now you can but any health insurance coverage you want". It's the free market, granny. If you're old with several preexisting conditions, insurance companies will be lining up to offer you great coverage. And you just keep electing them.
10
One might be but deeply ashamed for the negligence of Zernike & Rappeport here if not more angered by their refusal to note a prime driving force behind this demonstrably destructive legislation - that being of course (as well known to all staff and readers of NYTimes yet nevertheless worth mention again in an article to this topic) the extortionate force that unelected Svengali Grover Norquist and his nefarious Americans for Tax Reform hold over all GOP threatened if defiant to be ousted by more disciplined anti-tax robots in the next primary.
One could run on, but all are aware of who's leading or driving the lemmings, which does not mean such indispensable information should ever be omitted from reporting of these directly-impacted events.
5
Wouldnt economic logic dictate that financial advisers calculate the US budgets recurring spending requirements as well as projected new liabilities ,BEFORE giving away 1.5 TRILLION ,to already overstuffed corporate bank accounts and t "greediest 400 list of oligarchs"....... based on "projected investment return" ?
Sounds a lot like "the rolling dice " strategy of debt-credit swap bundling of the 2008 financial crash ........oh sorry, I forgot THIS IS HOW debt capitalism works.......with safeguards of the Treasury printing press and government bonds........to cover any losses !
4
Let's cut out all perks and pensions for all elected federal politicians. Let's cut the military budget by closing a few bases around the world. Let's cut all corporate handouts which use tax dollars.
As for Medicare and Social Security, the Republicans must think I am greedy. In 6 years I'll be receiving $1400 a month when I turn 63. Wow! I'll be living like a millionaire on the tax payer dime. Those Republicans must have knowledge that I don't have. And I better not get seriously ill at age 63. Those Republicans must think at age 63 I'll be a spring chicken.
I suggest that all us Democrats go out and vote. It's time to get active.
7
On an average , states spend half their budgets on Medicaid and welfare programs. More than double that for education. I think this is inherently wrong. No country can move forward with this kind of resource allocation.
Your math doesn't work. If you spend 50% on Medicaid/welfare and 100% (double that) on education, that would be 150% of the state budget.
States cannot print money, and most operate under balanced budget rules. So go back and check your numbers.
5
“The way to get at fixing the debt is to feel like everybody is willing to put something on the table,” said Maya MacGuineas, the president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a bipartisan group. “Once you have one side grab all it could, you’re never going to have the other side show up.”
Exactly, except she means the poor and I mean the wealthy. A more brazen handout to the wealthy while harming the poor has not happened in my lifetime seven decades. The wealthy, even those who are for safety nets, just got a huge tax reduction that would easily have paid for the safety net programs without harming the poor and middle class. We are definitely moving to a new gilded age, wherein the lower classes suffer while the upper classes luxuriate.
Gilded ages are only golden for the wealthy.
6
"...or incentive to negotiate cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the entitlement programs that are driving up spending,"
Come on NYT Social Security is not an entitlement nor is Medicare. I have paid into these systems my entire life. Now, one month from retirement I have been placed a precarious position of wondering if they will be there for me. Trickle down economics has always led to economic collapse so I am also left to wonder about the future value of my 401's that I have diligently invested in. Please NYT do not adopt the Republican rhetoric of labeling these programs as "entitlements". You of all institutions should recognize the power of language to shape ideas.
6
The trump tax plan is an assault on working Americans
It steals from workers to give to business owners.
It is class warfare and should cost the gop every seat in 2018 and 2020
9
This mama bear is poked!
All income should be taxed as ordinary income and subject to taxes for Medicare and social security
That is not a tax increase it is called being a member of society
5
December 2017 Step One-Tax Reform: Accomplished! Tax-Reform=Reduce Medicare & Social Security: Federal revenues will be reduced immediately as corporations see windfall tax reductions for life and individuals get a small temporary tax reduction. Corporations will not create jobs, they will increase CEO pay, stock buy-backs and dividend payments. Individual taxes will take a giant bounce up once the provisions sunset. Can you say, "Kicking the can down the road."
January 2018 Step Two=Fiscal Responsibility=Reduce Medicare & Social Security: Now the rubber meets the road. The "benefits" we worked a lifetime to achieve are re-defined as "entitlements." We paid (taxed on our income) into a system to receive Medicare & Social Security benefits but now those "entitlement" programs will be reduced to balance the budget/off-set the deficit by making villains and scapegoats of those with less.
As a result of repealing the Individual Mandate (requiring having healthcare coverage) you and I will end-up paying for uncompensated care: the hospital bills of those individuals who use emergency rooms as their primary care physicians; costs of those who had coverage yesterday and those who will un-enroll. This is a perfect example of you can pay me now or pay me later. You and I get to pay both times!
6
Great! I can't wait for the financiallyl sound policies of Harding, Coolidge and Hoover.
3
Republicans use the term "Starve the Beast" . I've figured this out. They really mean starve the middle class and the poor.
5
My Medicre-financed chemotherapy costs $75,000 a year. What am I supposed to when that payment gets cut? Die? Would that make Ayn Rand and Paul Ryan happy?
31
GOP rotten to the core; best of luck.
5
Republicans have very short memories. Apparently they don't recall how cutting taxes worked out for Kansas, or for George W. Bush. Cutting taxes NEVER "grows the economy," especially when people are denied the education and skills to allow them to move up the ladder to better paying jobs that allow them to feed their families, pay for healthcare, pay for college, and have some left over for discretionary spending.
56
So now that the Republicans feel confident on their TAX Bill, once this is signed they want to address the deficit. Now go after Medicare and Social Security.
People need to get active take to the streets. They want to address the deficit on the backs of working people. Unite and Resist. We all need to fight back. People also need to VOTE! Together working people are a Loud Voice.
11
Correction: Social Security is not an entitlement. It is something we all pay 10s of thousands of dollars into in the good faith that we will have certain benefits when we need them. It is a "trust" and an "earned retirement income" that has been raided in the past and may well be again if we're not vigilant in protecting it.
24
You are correct in saying that you pay into SS. However you are incorrect in assuming that the you are paying for yourself. That money is to pay for someone who is already retired. When your turn comes ,you better hope for enough people to be paying into the system for you. Cut it whichever way you like, it is a Ponzi Scheme.
1
No, Social Security is a massive redistribution if wealth. Low earners receive way more in benefits than they ever put in. Also, it is not a “trust.” Mechanically, the system uses current contributions to fund current retiree payouts. That means there is no investment income, which is a terrible way to run a social security program.
1
Raise the social security retirement age to 67 for newborns and and those who come afterward. Abolish the Department of Education. Raise the Medicare age to 67 for newborns and those who come afterward. Start investigating disability fraud and putting people in jail in large numbers. that will get us started in a way that I don't think anyone would make others get upset. Maybe the Department of Education thing would be difficult, but we did just fine with education before it. Maybe better.
So you want to fix disability fraud by paying for these people to be in jail? Sounds like a solid plan.
5
This should be a no-brainer for people who want to cut spending on foreign relations and refused to increase spending on defense of embassies during the previous administration: CUT DEFENSE SPENDING.
12
Republicans in Congress don’t care what the public thinks. They are ready to do the dirty work to keep the oligarchs happy. This will not be the same country when they are done in the state houses and congress. Watch what happens in the 2018 elections to voter suppression and 2020 census.
14
Corporate raiders and private equity firms like Mitt Romney's old shop, Bain Capital, are masters at taking over a company, breaking it up, and keeping its retirement assets as a generous reward. In the case of the hostile government takeover by Trump, McConnell, and Ryan, it's going to be a two step robbery. First we have massive tax cuts for corporations and the rich (unneeded and undeserved btw). Then you have cuts to social safety net programs to help pay for the theft (which they know won't pay for itself).
At the end of the day you can't call it class warfare if you don't fight back. Right now it feels more like a massacre. We'll see how much fight the Dems have in November 2018.
52
GOP exclamation to all Americans except for their billionaire overlords:
"Drop Dead".
25
How is this travesty allowed to be considered constitutional? Republicans are raping and pillaging our country. Do none of them have any moral rectitude?
12
My name is Paul Ryan, Millionaire, I own a Mansion and a Yacht. The rest of you can just drop dead for all I care. Especially you poor and middle class people who were either to stupid or socially responsible to become rich like me.
19
I weep for our country
19
There is still time for Senators like Susan Collins, John McCain and Jeff Flake to ponder on Thursday’s vote and join Bob Corker when the Joint Committee bill is seen for what it is, “a Moral Abomination.“*
*John Bogle - Vanguard Investments founder
18
GOP motto: cut spending on anything that helps 99% of us because the 1% need it more. Tax breaks need to go to those who don't have enough tax breaks or who exert enough of a pull to get them whether they need them or not.
GOP motto: 47% of Americans are moochers. They don't pay taxes and therefore don't deserve to get anything at all from the government. The 1% do because they have all the money that we, the GOP need to run for office.
Last GOP motto: he who has the most money gets the most attention. The rest of you can drop dead.
18
this has been classic GOP economic strategy since the Great Deceiver, Ronnie Reagan. Cut taxes, create a deficit, and have no funds left to pay for social programs.
then force Democrats to either raise taxes for our social welfare or accept cuts to these programs.
one more GOP ingredient: always always be sure to raise the defense budget!
22
What everyone needs to tell their Republican Congressman is that you and I paid into Social Security and Medicare for years. These payments were premiums for our post 65 old age pension and medical coverage. We are owed this money. And the facts are that most Americans of retirement age have not saved enough to live on and will depend completely on Social Security. Why oh why do the Republicans want to punish the American people?
20
The American people mean only one thing to them - money that can be transferred to the 1%. We are nothing to them beyond cash generators for the already obscenely wealthy in this country. In turn, the obscenely wealthy take excellent care of their puppets in government. We've been moving toward this state of affairs for a long time - ever since Reagan - and the apathy and lack of knowledge on the part of the American voter has worked in their favor. We put them there so they could do this damage. The only solution is to vote them out before we no longer have the ability to do so.
6
Look. There are no surprises here. This is Conservative ideology in action. This is also what enough of the country voted to support, even if they didn't understand the implications. We'll see how it goes.
Do I think this is going to work to the benefit of the people who voted in support of Conservative ideologues? Of course not. It's a rehash of the same failed economic theory. Even Reagan figured out that trickle down economics was garbage. The first President Bush called it "voodoo" economics.
But more importantly, Conservatives want to destroy the safety net that was created under FDR. Their vision is to return America to a land of vast inequality and reduced freedom, where the many can be effectively controlled by the few. Given how the many votes, they may have a point.
24
I agree with you on most of your points, Jesse, ut please don't lose sight of the fact that nearly 3,000,000 more votes were cast for a Democrat president in 2016, one who would have vetoed the present tax-cut bills. Gerrymandering by the Republicans ensured dt's electoral college win, not the popular vote.
7
Through my teachings in the Humanities and Western Civilization I have learned that the growth of civilization and developing a higher civilization is recognized in how we take care of our children, the elderly, and health and safety protections of its citizens.
This administration and Republicans are intent upon destroying American civilization that has no empathy for a good portion of our nation to be near or in poverty and/or to be uninsured for healthcare, and the rest of us carrying that expense through higher fees and costs so that the wealthy and business do not share the tax burden.
Republicans anr managing the greatest dismantling of American Civilization.
The economic growth Republicans imagine, because it is not proven from current historical statistics from other previous tax reductions
or research data, is a return to the Middle Ages of serfdom as a result of inequality.
We will be repeating history.
Because of human will and determination civilization will return again, but only after an epidemic/pandemic, immense natural disaster, world war, or large civil unrest.
Throughout the ages conservatism, because of its innate extremism of either excessive greed, religion, or ideology ignores history and empirical data for its power.
I can only reason that we humans have faults, weaknesses, and act irrationally against our own best interest, that as we say "we repeat history", good or bad
14
Old people vote Republican. Poor people and young people don’t. The cuts will be to Medicaid now and Social Security and Medicare for Millenials.
11
That's true. The younger among us need to show up at the voting booths, not just in the streets or in tweets.
5
Five years ago this coming June of 2018, my wife was taken critically ill spending three weeks in University Hospital, El Paso, TX, eight weeks in a nursing facility here in Las Cruces, New Mexico recovering to become well enough to come home, then seven weeks of in home nurse visits two times a week with OT and PT at home as well, followed by twenty-five weeks of outpatient PT and OT and traveling to Mayo Brothers in both Scottsdale and Phoenix, AZ for additional medical care as an outpatient. The final bill came to over $200,000. Medicare as currently configured and administrated paid for a large portion of the total bill plus a supplementary health insurance plan my wife has was also used. We had to pay a total of $750. If Medicare had not been administered and delivered as it presently is today, we would be either on the streets or in a tent city.
16
GOP politicians -- If you want to make necessary cuts to those programs that won't be harmful to others, then consider the overuse of screening colonoscopy in the Medicare population. Medicare usually pay the full cost for this test, so its free for the Medicare population, and many of them have these tests done more often than necessary. This is according to the National Center of Biotechnology Information. NCBI.NLM.NIH.GOV . Look it up.
What I hope you do not do is to cut unhealthy people off of the Social Security Disability rolls. I heard a rumor that Trump and an adviser floated that idea around last year. While there's no doubt that a small percentage of people do not deserve to be on it, many are deserving. It's not easy to get on disability anyways, and many claims are denied anyways. Also, many of the people on disability have pre-existing conditions that private insurance companies rejected these people for.
3
Really? Our budget problem--our enormous deficit--can be solved by cutting colonoscopy tests for the elderly? Trump and the Repulsive Party want to cut Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security and do away with unions and rights for workers and protections for the most vulnerable populations as well as the environment. You can not reason or negotiate with killers, liars, and thieves. If you're not wealthy, you're in trouble.
5
I happen they do try to cut spending right away in 2018 so that the connection is clear between the tax cuts and entitlement cuts - I work for a non profit in Iowa for people with intellectual disabilities and Medicaid has already been deeply hurt in Iowa by our republican governors switching to a privitized system. People are hurting right now and I am scared for the people I support and my job - but more than that - there are lots of people who don’t want their taxes to pay for other people but don’t realize that they too might need the social safety net if something happened to them. It’s time we realized that a well funded social safety net benefits all of us and us wirth paying for
10
They won't be that stupid. "Structural changes" means changes that will affect younger beneficiaries starting a few years from now. They won't know what hit them.
1
Soylent Green; Star Trek episode "Half a Life"; Logan's Run? Sound familiar?
Odd that we thought they were just fiction.
7
Can we sue congress for reckless and malicious lawmaking?
16
I am a liberal Democrat. I believe social security is an essential program. I strongly oppose the efforts of people like Paul Ryan to "privatize" (or effectively repeal) it.
However, we must be honest about how the program really works. Many comments here talk about how we each pay into social security over our working lives. This is indeed the political and social contract for how social security is commonly viewed - as if we are buying an annuity administered by the federal government.
In practice, current workers pay for current retirees. The problem is that life expectancy has dramatically increased, while fertility rates have fallen.
The correct solution is that the SS retirement age need to rise (reflecting the good news that we are living longer). And the SS age should be indexed to life expectancy, to take politics out of it going forward. This will ensure that the program remains solvent indefinitely, by stabilizing the ratio of workers to retirees.
I discussed this more in the following comment here:
- https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/02/us/politics/tax-cuts-republicans-enti...
For those of you who argue that you paid into social security like an annuity, you are indirectly supporting the position of people like Paul Ryan who want to privatize it - because a private annuity offers a better rate of return than social security for the majority of people.
9
That's a good explanation, thanks for that comment.
3
Re: "... leaving government leaner and the safety net skimpier for millions of Americans."
In other words, constricting the economy.
Doesn't anyone understand the relationships among appropriations, GDP, and taxes?
6
If it weren’t about cutting the safety net and more about auditing/economizing it, I would be into it.
1
I live on Social Security and a pension. My insurance, includong Medicare, is excellent, so I don't have that worry, as many other retired people do. But I still need to budget every dollar, and I have recently been through bankruptcy for the first time. I HAVE TO PLAN because I live on a fixed income.
The Republicans in Congress are extremely bad planners. They need to make a realistic budget THEN determine how much they need in revenue. Unlike people like me, the are not on a fixed income. They have the ability to tax individuals and other entities as needed.
BUT. THEY. DON'T. AND. THEY. WON'T.
7
"Trump voters are getting what they deserve,more poverty..."
.........................................................
No Democrats are getting what they deserve for a party that ignored American workers.
Democrats in government have fought for a small number of children who want to use the toilet of their choice in public school and for eight years ignored the stagnant wages of American workers.
What have Democrats in government to done for American workers that can not live on low minimum wages, or American workers that can only only work part time? The answer is nothing.
The reality is that Democrats in government will not fight for American workers since if they did there would be less campaign money for business companies.
Democrats in government are only willing to fight for "liberal" ideas that will not lessen the campaign money that they will receive from business companies.
Republicans will not win in 2018 unless Democrats politicians finally understand they need the the votes of American workers. But this will not happen since Democrats in government are that different from Republicans who want the campaign money of business companies.
2
I think you are basically incorrect, but your comment raises a really interesting point about perception. If people pay attention only to these so-called "social issues" or what we use to call values issues and ignore or are unaware of the fiscal and other basic issues that are important to Democrats, of course they will not have a clear understanding of what they need to do at the polls.
1
Allow me to summarize:
Both parties are lost. The two party system is dumb.
1
I have always considered those who swindle the elderly to be some of the worst of criminal elements because the people they swindle cannot go out and work hard to recover the money that they need to live on. Those who are disabled are also in this position. IF this tax increase does indeed ratchet down Medicare coverage, I think many of those of us who are now old and have worked hard all of our lives will find ourselves left at this end of our lives to die early from cancer or other health conditions. It seems basically disrespectful.
10
The Republican justification for blowing a big hole in the deficit is that the economic stimulus of even more cash on hand for large corporations will grow the economy at an insupportable rate.
This is like buying an expensive house and relying on getting a big raise next year. It's speculation.
Once again, Republicans have set the stage for Grover Norquist's ukase to drown the government -- and all but the likes of Donald Trump -- in the bath tub.
7
Sadly, this is the government we get when over 30% of the voting populace sits out elections. If this vulgar give-away to the rich and corporations doesn't wake people up to the fact we're being pilfered and lied to, we're doomed.
11
We have to cut spending and waste in every area of the federal government to pay for those essential constitutional duties. Medicare is a disaster as is the ACA. Social security also needs attention. More directly a lot of things that the federal government does will be eliminated or sent to the states to pay for. Reality comes to Washington DC finally.
1
The states must levy taxes in order to make up the shortfall, and that has been made more difficult by these bills.
A sicker population and one that cannot produce the expertise in the sciences and communications that business needs (see: taxation of grad student stipends) will bring reality to the economy faster than the ideologues of the GOP.
2
"Will be sent to the states to pay for."
We are already paying - more accurately we New Yorkers, New Jerseyites and Californians are already paying - for you in Tennessee and other low-income red states.
For every dollar Tennessee sends it gets eight back. And your neighbors in Mississippi and Alabama are even more dependent. So please, spare us the lectures as Republicans continue to pick Blue States' pockets and then wring their hands about lean government and entitlements.
6
So those of us who have been working for 40 years and contributing to social security will now have the rug pulled out from under us. Whatever tax cut the middle class gets won't be enough to offset the loss of Social Security and Medicare.
11
I think that the way they'll cut the benefits is to make the changes prospective and means-tested. (Paul Ryan has talked about making Social Security a means-tested benefit for years.) They think that those who receive Social Security and Medicare benefits won't care that their children and grandchildren won't receive those benefits due to "budget balancing." The Republicans think that senior citizens are as selfish and short sighted as they are.
[In my state, Republicans will find a way to blame the losses of benefits on the alleged past fiscal profligacy of Barack Obama. They'll still vote Republican and still be racists.]
There will be other "budget balancing" cuts too in SNAP, in Section 8, in HUD subsidies for Section 202 senior and handicapped housing, in Medicaid.
8
If they are means tested that will discourage saving.
4
Make sure you never vote for another Republican or any member who voted for this bill.
2
Time to fight these car thieves who wear suits and ties. They may think enough of us are stupid and ignorant enough to be rolled, and they might be right about that. But fight we must. This is war. Better to go down fighting then die like sheep. So fight now. Tell everybody you know that these guys are stealing from us all, and so they must be voted out. Don’t wait for the media or anybody else to fight for you. We all must fight.
14
Make sure not to vote for any Republican candidate in the next election, particularly those who voted for this bill.
2
I want to believe that reducing SS and Medicare would be the one thing that Republican voters would rally against because they would SEE that reduction impacting themselves or their elderly loved ones. But then again these are the same voters who chose Trump and still think Trump is doing great.
15
Eliminate Social Security and old people will be dying in the streets.
9
It is not too severe to call Republicans what they are: Traitors to the American people. This tax bill is a sham, a lie and a massive assault on working Americans who believed in the system. When you betray the citizens, you are by definition a traitor, and that is exactly what this monstrous bill does.
18
The democrat/socialist/slavery government model has been with us for eons. It has crippled individual liberty and entitled the most ruthless, charismatic and lucky since before time began.
Where does self achievement end and self service at the expense of everyone else begin. We may not know the answer to that question but we sure know it is alive and thriving in the democrat party ranks. Would you trust your fate opposing a Clinton, a Pelosi, a Warren, a Holder, Lynch,Obama, Franken? The lie that Welfare and Obamacare as constituted are anything but creeping attempts to institute government controlled slavery, AKA "Entitlements", is debunked by the worlds caste systems from the least to the most brutal. Europe to North Korea.
We, The US under Trump, may not be the answer but we certainly are not the problem.
I'd take any one of your list, some with great reluctance, over any of the economic royalists, oligarchs and their political coat holders you support any day. The Ayn Rand/Orwellian concept of freedom you promote only serves to lock in this emerging American banana republic.
1
Not sure how you can equate quality healthcare and some semblance of economic security with state slavery. They have neither of those things in North Korea. I think you need to read a history book.
1
Starve the beast and then drown American democracy in the bath tub. That is both the GOP and Putin's goal. No wonder they work so well together.
10
So what have the Republicans offered in terms of lifting the minimum wage,..
Barry of Nambucca Australia
...................................................................
Republicans do not offer American workers to raise the minimum wage.
Instead Republicans lie to American workers and promise them that there will be better jobs. This is better than Democratic politicians that ignore American workers.
Republicans will win in 2018 since Democrats believe that they can ignore American workers.
Ironic that the GOP wants to gut peoples healthcare considering they are a malignant cancer on the body politic.
They haven't invented a swear word strong enough to describe them.
I suppose "pity" might be the best word we currently have, considering it's the highest form of disgust.
6
So when Trump is impeached for Russian collusion and faces treason, Logan Act, fraud and other numerous charges...will his signature on these bills remain valid?
4
The public is very informed and engaged even on this tax bill which is usually yawn inducing. So, bring on entitlement reform, R’s and prepare to lose everything.
4
Robber Baron Congress
8
Hillary Clinton won the election by three million votes. Yet for the second time in 16 years a second minority president took office who makes the unsuccessful first look like an American Statesman. We now have a draft dodging , women abusing, Nazi endorsing, white supremacist supporting, climate change denying and regulation cancelling occupant of the once respected Oval Office of the American Presidency. And those are his good points. The worst is yet to come until Mr. Mueller completes his investigations. In the meantime everyone who writes on these pages that sees the dangers ahead, must begin to articulate that their comments made on the New York Times on on any of the issues of the day are not differences between "liberal" and "conservative", Republican and "Democrat" but between the Constitution and those that would undermine it or twist its intentions so that instead of providing for the "General Welfare"
would provide for "Corporate Welfare" particularly at a time when the stock markets are soaring as they have sine President Obama took office. Finally, we must post our comments on those sites read by the Trump's base so they can be exposed to those actions of government that have over several generations provided for the nation's welfare and their own.
8
I cut my cable quite some time ago but still cannot escape trump's foul mouth. He is speiling forth that the Democrats did not vote for the republican HIGHWAY ROBBERY BILL. To me that is high praise coming from that awful person.
5
THE FUNDAMENTALLY, INSENSITIVE, DISHONEST, UNETHICAL
CONGRESS,MOSTLY REPUBLICAN CONTINUE UNABASHED, WHAT A DISGRACE, VOTE THEM OUT SAP
5
How about those Golden Parachutes of Congressional retirement entitlements these hawgs get from us? They have their lobbiests to take care of them. They should be on 401ks like the rest of us.
9
First World?! Not any more. Trumpville's made up of panhandling junkies are forming in the bushes beyond the sound wall along the freeways of Minneapolis. Expensive condos grow like mushrooms downtown.
4
I don't know how these people live with themselves.
8
One of two less stealth bombers would be more compassionate.
4
Attention - GOP, traitors to the American people, we the people will be speaking next November at the polls and you'll hear us roar!
7
Scrooge Jumps for Joy at the crushing of Bob Cratchit and Tiny Tim
4
I would emigrate, but I already did.
Just wondering now when the uninformed poor who voted for Trump will (ever) figure out he’s scamming them, not to mention ruining the country. Con artist in Chief…
6
It's not just Trump. This has been the Republican game plan for decades. They are remorseless in fighting a class war for the rich. That's their sole excuse for existence.
4
Love the photo. Satan's Apprentice, in all his well scrubbed glory.
Thanks, GOP.
2
Paul Ryan - with his childish weird lie about running a much faster marathon and his at-all-costs removal of the safety net that gave him a ladder out of poverty as a young man - what's he thinking? Is it just Trumpian denial of who he is, so he never looks like a man who ever needed help, who's always powerful, when he's completely mortal?
Nothing like climbing that ladder and yanking it up behind you to show who you really are. We see you.
6
What a hideous future we have facing us. On the other hand, perhaps those who blindly voted for Trump will finally get the message: their "Make America Great Again" president is only interested in making the rich richer. As for the nitwit Ryan and his bag-of-wind associate McConnell, their days are surely numbered.
5
I guess I'm the only one who sees people chatting on their iPhones while paying for groceries with EBT cards, or who knows someone on disability taking a vacation I can't afford.
2
There was a Russian peasant who found and rubbed a magic lamp: the genie offered gold/palace/ health care/ but no this peasant wanted the genie to kill his neighbor's horse.
2
Yes you must be the only one. I've never seen either of those things. I doubt that you have seen those things either. The only people on disability that I know have scraped by and certainly never gone on vacations.
3
I have been saying this for years: Republicans have hated the New Deal and Great Society since their inception and they now can undo all the good that was done to make American people more equal (still a long way to go) and form a strong middle class. Welcome to the New Gilded Age with little to no protection for the less fortunate (those making less than $75,000/year), sick, elderly, children, etc. The hatred and maliciousness towards their fellow Americans is disgusting.
8
I knew this was coming. This abomination of a bill is an excuse for them to dismantle the social safety net our most vulnerable populations...children, the elderly and working poor depend on. Congratulations, Republicans..
How do you sleep at night?
7
Most vulnerable? No. I suspect the real plan is to steal from those of us who aren't subsistence level by "Means testing". They are coming after those of us who actually saved for our retirements by deciding we no longer "qualify" for something we paid into our entire working lives. Grab your pitchforks America it's time to take the fight to the streets.
4
Don't get angry; get even.
5
I wonder why there's no headline about the pending tax bill on foxiness.com. Oh, that's because there's no way to phrase it positively.
1
It's time to take back our country. Don't vote Republican.
7
The Republicans are basically driving this country to destruction. By cutting taxes even further on the rich, refusing to invest in the future (like any normal business would do; ironic because the GOP claims to want gov't. to be more business-like), cutting the social safety net and empowering the crazies in their base that keep them in power, I think they'll eventually lead to the dystopian futures we see in the movies and maybe civil war. I fear for the future of this country. And the Democrats enabled this by being so Wall Street-centric in the last 25 years. If they'd continued fighting for the working people by endorsing curbs on Wall Street behavior, not repealing Glass-Stegall, pushing Medicare for all, $15/hour living wage, etc., the idiots who voted for Trump would have voted for Democrats and their Bernie Sanders/Elizabeth Warren values.
Once the US falls, how far behind is war around the world between the authoritarian, religious zealot, ultra-rich, intolerant faction and the more tolerant, compassionate, rational faction. Come on humanity. Get your act together!
7
GIVE THE REPUBLICANS NOTHING, NO HELP.
Make them own each and every cutback -- this is war.
8
I wish all the Major news outlets Would write a story about our most famous Welfare recipient Paul Ryan.
9
"Now, when you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he's probably not going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small. But he is going to ask you what you did for the poor. You better have a good answer,"
John Kasich
7
While the Republicans continually attack and harm the poor and middle class, the poor and middle class keeps voting them in because they are afraid of brown people and god? We are a barbaric, backwards race of people. Few among us are capable of anything more than basic survival and the Republicans know this. Unless Americans start educating themselves and start fixing the education system, they will become increasingly dumber an more credulous and in turn, easy prey for the Republicans who's goal is to own everything and leave few if any crumbs for everyone else. We will suffer just so these people can stash more loot in offshore accounts.
5
This is sad. Now you are going after the old and weak. I am one of them. I, regretfully voted for you. Tough lesson to learn and a bitter to pill to swallow. Never again.
8
Remember the Obamacare bill had $1 Trillion in cuts for Medicaid, and now we had a $1 Trillion hole. Coincidence? I think not.
1
This isn't just class warfare. This bill is intended to ensure white "elite" hegemony. This is the plantation class on a national scale. Outside of the GOP/Trump/donor class, the rest of us are trash in their eyes. I am totally disgusted. I'm ready to march on Washington, again.
10
It may be time to do what the French did and storm the palace. This fish is rotten from the head. We may need to start celebrating our own Bastille Day.
7
Stepping points to Victory. First, convince progressives that they can't possible vote for a Clinton because she isn't progressive enough and is a woman to boot.
Then, steps to destroy the hated government once above mission accomplished.
1) Spend years hating good laws that benefit average Americans and devising little tricks to cut expenditures so that those laws are rendered ineffective.
2) Invent dog whistles to convince GOP supports to love what are essentially fascist arguments.
3) Cut taxes as a Christmas present for the mindless proletariat but make it so 90% of the actual benefits go to the rich donor class
4) Then because the artificially reduced deficit is now outrageously high, cut all benefits and regulations because the budget must be balanced.
5) Blame Democrats for everything under the sun.
It's war folks, there is no other way to put this.
Readers, the only way we can stop is to elect Democrats who actually care about people to Congress. You must ignore those alternative left wing candidates that can siphon off your vote. To do so causes the evil side of American politics to win.
All of the events that have happened in the last year are a dizzying dream to those people who think good government is wrong and that white male thugs must always be in charge. Pack the courts so that abortion and guns laws can be eliminated! End equal rights for all! This is what we face. It is not a dream.
7
One commenter says,
"Here is an example of what the Democrats would do:
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/
"
I hear a washer running when I click on the link.
Looks the link takes us to a private web server in someone's basement.
Wonder whose basement it is ... Mmmm.
Go out and tell any one who will listen - vote the Republican members of Congress out of office before they completely destroy the American middle class!
7
Dear Paul Ryan,
Are you going to pay back the United States Treasury for the social security benefits your family received after your father's untimely death?
I didn't think so.
6
Given the way that the Republican mind seems to work, Paul Ryan will believe that his family was specially deserving of Social Security benefits following his father"s death while the rest of us are not
5
I lived with them on Montague Street
In a basement down the stairs
There was music in the café at night
And revolution in the air
Then he started into dealing with slaves
And something inside of him died
She had to sell everything she owned
And froze up inside
And when finally the bottom fell out
I became withdrawn
The only thing I knew how to do
Was to keep on keeping on like a bird that flew
Tangled up in blue.
2
Shouldn't people who go into government service be trying to help people instead of making their lives miserable?
PAUL FEINER
Greenburgh, NY Town Supervisor
5
If Demos can shelve some of the identity crises for a bit & disseminate the particulars of this "tax reform" to the voting public, maybe we can kick these greedy monsters out of office next term.
I see that this article is no. 11 in the trending lineup. That is not a good sign.
6
It is now so abundantly clear why Trump remains in office despite his abhorrent misconduct. He is a distraction. He will never be impeached and removed from office despite whatever final moves Mueller makes. The Republicans are the real criminals, thieves and brigands who steal from the poor and the vulnerable to give to the rich campaign donors who assure that members of Congress have health care and permanent jobs that pay well with an assured retirement that has few limits. The cruelty of these men and women is beyond measure. They are traitors and unimaginably cruel and cynical thieves.
8
getting the gov. off my back is why I and my family came to North America. Praise Trump!
#FridayNightMassacre
We won’t forget, Republicans.
8
You have to wonder just how stupid voters are. They voted for this lunatic and the cabal of insane and unfeeling Republicans who enable him! HERE IS THE TRUTH: Florida Senator Marco Rubio admitted that the Republican tax cut plan to aid corporations and the wealthy WILL REQUIRE CUTS to Social Security and Medicare to pay for it.
Rubio told reporters this week that in order to address the federal deficit, which will grow by at least $1 trillion if the tax plan passes, Congress WILL NEED TO CUT ENTITLEMENT PROGRAMS such as Social Security and Medicare. Advocates for the elderly and the poor have warned that entitlement programs would be on the chopping block, but this is the first time a prominent Republican has backed their claims.
THIS IS WHAT REPUBLICANS THINK OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE!
11
I wrote my US Representative and US Senators about the automatic "budget balancing" impact to Social Security and Medicare. They are all Republicans and all voted for the tax bill. All I got in response was a press release about how wonderful the tax bill was.
3
The article says "Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the entitlement programs that are driving up spending, but are also the pride of the Democratic Party. . . " My my. What drivel. What is driving up the federal deficit is the enormous amount of money spent on "defense" i.e. endless wars in the interest of the oil companies, the defense contractors and delusions of world domination. The NY Times does a great disservice stating that Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security are "driving up spending." It is not a fact, it is an opinion, and a pro-war, anti-working class one at that.
105
AUDIT THE MILITARY.
4
Elections have consequences although the susan Sarandons of the world don't seem to realize that
1
There are bright red counties in Appalachia where 90% of the voters depend on SS and other "entitlements" like food stamps and Medicare to survive. I fail to see how Ryan's plans will enhance the GOPs ability to retain control of Congress and the White In 2018 and 2020. Fox News and Limbaugh may be able to mislead and fool these voters now, but when those reduced SS checks show up in mailboxes and the local hospital closes, how will TN, OH, WV, KY, PA, and MI vote?
7
By then it will be too late. They are not smart enough to blame this President or Congress. A new administration would probably be in office at that time and Americans will hold that administration accountable.
3
I think that the Republicans will make the major painful benefit decreases prospective in hopes that current recipients will be desperate enough to accept a bargain which denies their children and grandchildren eligibility for the same benefits they receive. The Republicans will also blame it on the alleged fiscal profligacy of Obamacare. Racism always plays well to their base.
3
these people you describe as dependent upon federal benefits are also brainwashed --by 40 years of supply side GOP nonsense, reinforced by right wing propaganda in Fox, Sinclair radio, prosperity churches, and now social media. they are also mostly undereducated. nothing will change. democracies die when passionate minorities, like today's angry white men, are allowed to have outsized power.
1
My Congressman is Steve Stivers. He served in Afghanistan. He told us he was against raising the debt back in 2006 and would put money in escrow to pay for the debt. He also wanted A.G. Holder impeached for the "Fast and Furious" program to aggressively confront Mexican drug trafficing which President Bush initiated and AG Holder ended because American Border Agents were killed by the weapons intended to be used against drug traffickers. Impeachment never happened. He voted for the tax reform. He voted for adding $1 trillion to our debt. He revealed his hypocrisy of national service, "I serve 'like me'". I suspect many other or all Republicans in the House and Senate think like this. Sad, Where is the moral integrity that the least among these is the first whom we serve. This is a man with a family who has not spoken out against the Sexual Perpetrator-In- Chief, 45. The Republican Party is morally bankrupt when one of its best is silent about sexual harassment. Who should be impeached? Who tolerates military weapons in the public square? Which party tolerates sexual perpetrators in government. Which party sees reality clearly and responds sincerely.
6
I think people have to realize that they cannot just vote for whomever they perceive as the "best person" based on personal integrity. When you vote for any Republican you're also voting for the whole clap-trap Party of the rich. The result is things like this tax cut for the rich. Sorry, but in this Republican created age of extreme ideology and partisanship you have to vote by party, even, or maybe more so, for local offices.
5
Let this serve as an excellent lesson in Civics:
How A Bill Becomes A Law
And...why it's really, really important to vote.
........................................................
Why vote when Republicans will win in 2018 with the support of American workers.
Republicans lie to American workers that there will be better jobs for them while Democrats will promise that the children of American workers will have the choice of which toilet to use in a public school.
Democrats have ignored for years that wages for years have been stagnant for American workers.
2
Those who read my comments must be getting tired of my repetition of Abraham Lincoln, but the U.S. A. has not yet entered the land of 1984, so here goes again: "you can fool some of the people all or the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time". Look down the road twenty years or so, and most of the baby-boomer generation will be dead, and the current demography of the nation will be different: [a paraphrase} one generation cometh into being and another passeth away, but the earth abides forever.
2
The pattern of behavior exhibited by the Republicans confirms the worst fears that Greed trumps respect for law, patriotism and our constitution where the interests of the uber rich are concerned. They are all guilty of high crimes, and should all be thrown out of office and prosecuted for abetting high treason by Trump simply to get their graft.
6
This scheme is a little like a company announcing an increase in almost everyone's paycheck! ... while surreptitiously reducing employee benefits by far more and dumping the proceeds on senior execs.
This is truly a 'have your cake and eat it too' time for the GOP.
4
Republicans don't care about the poor, the aged, and the physically and mentally handicapped. Sure, they'll throw a bone here and there. But in their core, they are Social Darwinists at heart. They may suggest they care, but they do so half heartedly. They truly believe people sink or swim on their own and have little faith in the ways social programs transform individual lives, communities, and a country.
7
The Republicans will of course want to increase war (defense) spending. We need more women in congress so that human and family values are the priority, rather than pampering the rich and promoting guns. There are too many mean male bullies in Washington. If they are not chasing skirts, they are scheming the next war or soliciting "donations".
2
My female senator showed her values when she voted for the tax bill. Don't hold hope out for women to automatically be an improvement over men. Sometimes they're no different than men.
4
We, the people, have failed in stopping this criminal act from being perpetrated against us. The Republicans, a party of cruelty and greed, has won a battle to cause pain and suffering, loss and instability to the majority of Americans. Many, many Americans have still not recovered from the recession and there is no plausible, logical explanation for how giving more to the rich will resolve this. Opportunity for ALL and protection of the weakest members of society - the poor, the elderly, the disabled, are not entitlements, they are heartfelt responsibilities we hold as Americans and humans. The only thing we need to do now with Republicans, is throw them in a deep pit and let them rot, along with the rich.
4
If the Republicans think that they can just chop off Social Security and Medicare benefits and that none of us over 65ers will notice, take this warning. You will start an armed revolution that you will not win.
7
Once the legislation is passed there is almost nothing you can do, even if you kick them out of office. There will be another Republican who thinks the same way waiting to replace them.
1
If the Republicans are smart, they'll make the major changes in eligibilities prospective so the current recipients won't see as much pain (maybe no COLAs, maybe Medicare covering fewer expenses). The real pain will be your children and your grandchildren who won't be eligible for the same benefits you receive (For example, Paul Ryan's goals to means-test social security eligibility.)
It’s too late.
Maybe we should all just get back what we have contributed and nothing more? Don't you think that would be fair?
Paul Ryan wants to make receipt of Social Security benefits means-tested. It's possible that we will never even receive what we contributed.
1
i would take that sum...it must add up to quite a bit after 45 yrs of fica contibutions...i live on the slimmest of margins....trying not to think how this will affect my life.....feeling very uncomfortable.....where are we old people supposed to go when we cannot afford the real estate taxes on our homes....or to eat or go to the doctor...i already do not drive anymore because i cannot afford it...despair.
1
social security is an insurance program. does your auto instance rebate you all your premiums when you stop driving, because you paid more than you used? didn't think so.
I just went on the Fox News website -- no mention of any Republican plans to "review" Medicare, SS, or Medicaid. Those who rely on Fox and other right wing news sources most likely have no idea what Paul Ryan and company are cooking up next.
8
The cruel Republicans are back in full force.
Why does anyone who is not wealthy vote for these people?
6
People have been asking that question at least since Thomas Frank's "What's The Matter With Kansas." I've never found a completely satisfying answer.
3
This is the last push Bernie Sanders needs.
2
I wonder if the republicans will do the logical thing and remove the cap on FICA entirely. They could also isolate SS and take it out of the general fund. But that wouldn't make their donors happy, now would it, even though it would solve the shortfall. Much better to throw grandma out into the street after she followed the rules her entire life, working her fingers to the bone so that billionaires could buy another yacht.
8
Why has the NYTimes bought into the term "entitlements," used by the Republicans to call what we - the middle and lower classes - have paid into for generations? This is how attitudinal shifts are supported, by using language that is politicized, like climate change instead of global warming.
And, why do the Republicans want to starve, strangle and kill off (through no medical care) the middle and lower classes?
7
I dislike the term “entitlements.” When people have paid into Social Security and Medicare their whole lives then it isn’t exactly as if it is some free “handout” when they receive benefits. And isn’t it true that Medicare is the main health insurance program for people over 65? Regular insurance companies don’t want elderly people. They cost too much. Without Medicare only super rich elderly people will have health care. That is so wrong.
Perhaps the Republicans think we should do as the Vikings used to. When you were old and unproductive you could choose to be pushed off a cliff or swim out to sea and drown. That would cost nothing. There. I fixed your big bad budget problem for you Republicans. And it is right in line with your level of cruelty.
10
How can Democrats be so concerned about cutting taxes while they protect millions of illegal immigrants who don't pay federal income tax?
1
Even the conservative Heritage Foundation reports that illegal immigrants pay substantial federal income taxes. Along with other taxes. I believe you were referring to DJ Trump, who brags about not paying taxes? "That makes me smart." http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2016/oct/02/maria-teresa...
3
We have a president who's half insane and should be watched like a hawk and Mitch McConnell? He's using it to sneak through the most destructive cash give-a-way in history. How are we ever going to recover from these people, who have put us in a hole from which we may never be able to dig out? Our children? Hey, I guess it's their problem. Right, Mitch?
5
This period in the Nations history will be known as "The Great Dismantling"
7
The first thing that should be cut are the pay for any person, congressman or senator or president, who votes for this bill. They have chosen the top 5 percent of the population over the remaining 95%. Paul Ryan calls himself a Christian and wraps himself in the Flag, but he is just as bad a Huckster and Hustler as Trump and the rest of this band of thieves and liars called Republicans who mantra seems to be "Let's steal from the poor and give to the rich."
When are the people going to wake up. It won't be until Granny gets rolled out of the Nursing home and onto the street. Oh, but that would be "Fake News."
And by the way, the Zombie Apocalypse has happened - It's new name is The Republican Party.
5
Their vision is that of a society with a weakened and ineffective government dominated by a plutocratic class of wealthy families – a society that would more closely resemble feudal Europe than new deal America.
While they pander to racist America about the threat of Mexican immigrants, Republicans hope to create a Mexican style government and society. A society where wealthy families can take their capital and withdraw from society into their own private world, living off their capital in gated homes with private security and private schools. While a weak, under financed and ineffective government can’t even protect its citizens from the powerful and well financed drug cartels. A “small” (i.e. weak) government that is governed by an ungoverned plutocracy that answers to no one and has no need or interest in public institutions.
4
Surely no one is surprised by this; it's been in the Republican playbook for decades. They just needed a conman president to help push tax cuts for the wealthy over the line. As soon as the cuts get passed they'll be screaming about the deficit they just made worse. But not to worry, the military budget will remain high and trump's white nationalist culture wars will continue, but where will the wall money come from? What a (formerly great) country!
4
In case there is any doubt of the GOP's moral bankruptcy, there's this. The Republicans have killed their parents, and are now throwing the themselves on the mercy of the court because they are orphans.
Democrats will never be able to shame the GOP into doing the right, humane thing because Republicans are devoid of shame. But, even for them, this is beyond shocking. They voted for this tax bill -- drafted by lobbyists in secret-- that no one had read, that included handwritten notes in the margins, and probably had sticky notes attached. And, now they've already moved on to gutting Social Security and Medicare because of the deficits THEY created?
4
That’s been their plan all along. They could care less about our health and old age. Lucky for them that they only hurt others.
3
What happens when Trump starts a war and we need money for that? I’m afraid that will be the excuse to gut Social Security, etc.
2
"entitlement programs that are driving up spending" ??
Is this actually the NYTimes' version of what is going on here?
The Social Security Trust Fund has nothing to do with the national debt.
Social Security Insurance is funded separately from the rest of the federal budget, & if all the IOUs were repaid from all the times money has been 'borrowed' from SSI for other programs, we would be a long way closer to making it solvent indefinitely.
One thing that 'drives up spending' is the unquestioned free rein given the Dept of Defense to wage wars in dozens of countries around the world, without a peep of discussion as to how to pay for it.
It isn't the lavish luxury life on Medicaid, unemployment & food stamps that is costing this country our standing in the world & our economic well-being.
It's the strip-mining of GDP by corporate fat cats, aided & abetted by two almost equally despicable political parties, who operate hand-in-glove exactly like a crime syndicate.
5
We are rapidly becoming a country where if you are not really rich you are poor. I hope euthanasia becomes legal in all 50 states. That may be the only humane option left for those of us who are not rich when we get sick or old. That is, if we can afford it.
3
May these entitled men have to walk in the shoes of fixed income elderly people. That is my wish.
7
This goes beyond cruelty. It is savagery.
6
We are watching another nail being placed in this country's coffin.
5
If the Republicans in Washington and their fiscal sponsors are so intent on transforming the United States into a third-world oligarchy, I suggest that they, like good consumers, do some comparison shopping. A good first step would be a trip to selected third-world oligarchies, preferably those with a corrupt, thuggish head of state and a rubber-stamp legislature. Even better would be to live for a while in one of these places, even living the life of the local rich. Of course, field trips of this kind would be much more time-consuming and disturbing than sitting comfortably by the fire, drink in hand, reading mail-order catalogues of government policy packed with fairy tales of trickle-down wealth, happy workers, and the benevolent intentions of sainted, but conveniently remote, founding fathers.
3
Despite your hard work, the costs of raising a family, saving for their kids’ with post high education, health care and insurance outlays, their wages and salaries stagnant most of their working lives, with many firms not offering 401k type programs, your piece of the American Dream, “little people”, is hereby terminated. As we move the goalposts farther out, you and, if applicable, your kids will see less deductions for the essentials, double taxation and higher taxes themselves.
We thank you for... Oh, look over there! A gay couple and some dark skinned folks. Doesn’t that just grind your teeth! What about the tax bill? What tax bill?
4
Will somebody remind the Red State voters that they will lose their social security and medicare payments, too.
Congratulations, Red State voters, as you starve and die of preventable causes. You did this to yourselves.
5
Republican's are giving us the "Great Regression". They want to return, perhaps to the 1920s, perhaps to the 1890s. Some may even long for the 1850s, but they may exceed even their expectations and find themselves back in the 1790s, with a modern guillotine waiting.
8
If you go on Facebook, you will read many hostile comments from our fellow citizens who preach that we don’t need to help the poor. Almost blaming them for their situations. They should be very careful because many of them may one day may be in the same shoes and then where will they turn once they have helped destroy the safety nets. One way or another we pay some how. Where is the grace and compassion and empathy? This kind of behavior is not making America great again.
8
Yes America, they are coming for your Social Security and Medicare! The social safety nets will be gone, grandma and grandpa will either be living with you, out on the streets or living in their car. How can this possibly happen? Just like Donald Trump happened.
American oligarchs spent years and millions of dollars perfecting their plan. They got hands-on experience in Chile where they privatized the pension fund among other things. Now after years of planning, clandestine meetings, they are in control of your government! Let the party begin.
What happens next? Calling a constitutional convention and making a few select changes to the fabric that held America together. The end result will be a new America. One without regulations or restraints on the billionaire class. The deconstruction of the administrative state indeed - the destruction of America in reality.
7
Social security is a vital program that keeps people out of poverty during their golden years. The main problem is that there are fewer current workers for more retirees. This is due to increased longevity and declining fertility rates.
When social security was started in 1935, there were dozens of workers for every retiree. By 1960, there were 5.1 workers per retiree. In 2010, there were only 2.9 workers per retiree, and the ratio is expected to 2.0 by 2030.
In 1935, the life expectancy was 61. Today the life expectancy is 78.6. People are living 17 years longer on average. And many of those years are in good health.
We need to raise the social security retirement age, and then index it to life expectancy. It would not be fair (or politically viable) to change this age for current or soon-to-be retirees.
I am 47 (born in 1969). I am fine with raising the social security age for my cohort and those younger than me to 70 or even higher. I believe this is the right way to preserve this valuable program.
4
Why is the answer always "raise the Social Security retirement age"? Not everyone sits at a desk. There are so many workers who have break breaking jobs or stand on their feet 10 or 12 hours a day. Should they be told to keep it up into their 70's so the rich fat cats can continue to hire them to do all the heavy lifting?
What about raising the cap on the amount of what gets paid into social security? Sure, Americans are living longer but also many, many folks today
are earning well above the cap used to determine how much a person pays into SS. It is all of $128,400. Making millions? Still only pay up to the $128,400 amount. Raising the top would help keep Social Security solvent for additional years.
4
Judy, I respect the points you are making. I agree that the cap on SS income can also be raised somewhat higher as necessary.
However, many people on this comment thread argue that SS is like an annuity that they have paid into. Raising the SS income cap too high would cause the SS benefits paid to be less than the amount many workers paid in (a negative return), negating the "annuity" argument.
Your point about people with physical jobs not being able to do those jobs at advanced ages is also valid. But we must look at what the main purpose of SS is. I believe it is meant to provide an income floor to keep older Americans out of poverty in their later years. It is not meant to be a complete retirement solution for everyone.
For people with physical jobs, why is 62 or 66 the magic age for retirement? Some of this work you describe is difficult to do even prior to that age. Physical labor for older workers is indeed an issue, but I don't think that SS is the solution for this.
My interest is in preserving SS for all workers for the foreseeable future. As we live longer, and stay healthier longer, I don't think it is fair or sustainable to keep the SS retirement age fixed at 65-66.
I wrote more about this issue in this comment:
- https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/02/us/politics/tax-cuts-republicans-enti...
1
I don't understand why Social Security is framed as an entitlement. I have been paying Social Security tax for over 30 years. That is not an entitlement. That is something that I have paid for. If my benefits are cut, that is taking away a benefit that I have already paid for.
6
If there is anyone who did not know that this tax cut was a back door to cut social security and medicare, you need to wake up now. That was the true intent all along. Marco Rubio states" we need to generate revenue and lower spending to decrease the deficit" so lets cut taxes??? Revenue to the U S government comes from taxes so this makes no sense.
Time to wake up and take action before it is to late. I have watched as systematically, step by step in a seeming chess game the American Dream has been dismantled. Forty years ago my dad made 35,000 yearly at a major computer firm. I know young people today making barely more who have student debt of at least that amount.
We don t have another decade to play this game. We are not winning. Please take the time to explain how things used to be in this country to the
20 somethings you know and encourage them to vote.
We have a choice to save ourselves now or let the final piece in the chess game be played.
5
My blood boils when they call social security and Medicare entitlements. I paid for those benefits for 40 years. Either give them to me or give me my money back.
4
Lawmakers will now need to cut Social Security to balance the budget. A start would be to limit Social Security payments so that recipients can’t take out more than they put into the system (perhaps payments plus 6% interest). Otherwise it’s a Ponzi Scheme. Cutting discretionary spending to balance the budget will not be enough. It’s time for all Americans to start saving for retirement on their own so that they don’t have to rely on Social Security. Most old people on Social Security today (ironically, many of them Trump supporters) have withdrawn much more than they put into the system. That is not sustainable.
I am tired of hearing Social Security and Medicare referred to as "entitlements" when I have been paying into these programs for more than 40 years. Social Security could be fixed quite easily by raising the salary cap, but then the wealthy might have to pay a little more. Well, I guess that's off the table.
6
I wish the word entitlement was not used to describe social security. I have being paying 7.5% of my income for this my entire life. The same goes for medicare. It is "insurance" I would have an income paid to me and I would have health care when I retire. The only people "entitled" to this income are the people that paid in to this. It's not for the GOP to take to give to their big time donors.
4
Republican politicians promise better jobs for American workers but really are only interested in the wealthy and business corporation that will provide more campaign money.
Democratic politicians promise to fight for "liberals" causes but ignore stagnant wages for American workers for over 15 years. "Liberal" causes are only the causes that will not turn away campaign money from business group.
Republicans will win in 2018 since they will have the support of American workers. It is smarter for Republicans to lie to American workers instead of Democrats ignoring American workers.
Sounds like we are back in the conversation - a long time one by Republicans - about the "deserving" poor and who and who is not. Payday lenders, over priced food, gas for work vs. mortgage/rent, no access to health care, no public transportation, living in isolated rural community only on social security - which of these situations, all of which are completely foreign to Congress, qualify as "worthy" and which will condemn most people to the margins of society, if one wants to call the result of all this a society. The next time you drop $200 for a meal, think of it as about 20% of what an average social security recipient receives for everything in a month. Where is Dickens when we need him?
2
I have always considered myself a moderate. I voted for Obama twice but my first choice in this election cycle would have been John Kasich if he had won the republican primary. I voted for Hillary as the lesser of two evils. I will never vote for a republican again.
5
Of course, the tax and Health Care cuts affecting the middle and lower classes will also be applied to the elected representatives of the Senate,Congress, and the bureaucracy of the U.S. government.
3
Is it really the responsibility of the general public to take care of everyone else? Not really.
3
John - as someone who has paid into the SSI / Medicare fund for over 40-years of working, I and millions of others are not seeking "welfare" - rather an honoring of the promises made to us that SSI and Medicare will be available and paid out as promised.
4
I have been paying payroll taxes for more than 30 years. So receiving Social Security checks would simply be receiving a benefit that I have been paying for for many years. On the other hand reducing my Social Security payment would be the government taking a benefit away from me, a benefit that I have already paid for.
If you are going to cut Social Security, you might as well cut benefits to the military.
5
Bring back the draft, and pay could be slashed to the level of a $25 monthly stipend, given that food, clothing and shelter are already covered by the taxpayer. Housing conscripts in WWII era open bay wood frame barracks foe the first two enlistments would eliminate the cost of family housing.
I can hardly wait for XMas dinner conversations with my Trump-supporter relatives. As residents of posh and politically red Orange County and San Diego County, I imagine they will be facing $3-4K more in federal taxes, at least. It will be so fun to watch their lower lips quiver as they wonder what just happened. The only thing better would be indictment of Jared Kushner by XMas.
14
The $25 billion in cuts to Medicare are mandated by Obamacare, which defunded Medicare to the tune of $0.8 trillion dollars as part of their plan to pay for Obamacare.
It is deceitful for the NYT and AARP to pretend that the cuts have anything to do with Republicans. Democrats voted in the cuts and AARP supported them because their for-profit insurance "donors" loved Obamacare.
If there is no restructuring of Medicare, with wealthy beneficiaries receiving reduced benefits, all beneficiaries will get reduced benefits because providers will refuse to treat them because of low reimbursement rates. And the wealthy will not be able to used supplements to cover the costs.
If there is no restructuring of Social Security, in 15 years all beneficiaries will get 20% benefit reductions. Republicans want those reductions to be concentrated at high income levels.
Democrats want to kick the can down the road. They reduced federal funding of Medicare and claim Republicans are at fault.
You cannot make this stuff up.
5
The Medicare budget cuts to fund Obamacare cane from excess spending on Medicare Advantage plans when the profit cap was set at 20%. Eliminating the Obamacare subsidies solidly result in those funds going toward tax cuts, not back into Medicare.
to quote a NYT pick post
"Social Security is a separately funded trust, paid for through employment contributions. It is not carried as part of the budget. The Republicans have no excuse for raiding this trust. Unfortunately that won't stop them."
So the Republicans have no legal basis to raid the Social Security trust fund for cash to cover any Budget deficit they created with their Tax bill.
1
Obamacare did not take $800 billion from Medicare, at least not as a direct transfer. You can read about it here: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/aug/07/mike-huck....
Social Security will be in perfectly fine shape as long as there is some tweaking with respect to incomes to which the payroll tax applies.
In any case, all this has relatively little to do with the huge transfer of wealth and accumulation of debt this colossally irresponsible tax bill - with no reform in sight - promises.
1
Of course this is what they want to do, and we have known it since Trump was elected. Where were the former Obama voters who voted for Trump? They were warned. We shouted, screamed and cried that this stupid and evil tax cut was going to be paid for by Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. It is the only place the GOP is going to pay for their folly. They didn't care about adding to the deficit because they knew they were going to take it out of the hides of middle America.
Voters! Understand that you have been robbed by the GOP and they will continue to rob you as long as they are in office. For God's sake, vote them out of office or you are lost.
17
One might be but deeply ashamed for the negligence of Zernike & Rappeport here if not more angered by their refusal to note a prime driving force behind this demonstrably destructive legislation - that being of course (as well known to all staff and readers of NYTimes yet nevertheless worth mention again in an article to this topic) the extortionate force that unelected Svengali Grover Norquist and his nefarious Americans for Tax Reform hold over all GOP threatened if defiant to be ousted by more disciplined anti-tax robots in the next primary.
One could run on, but all are aware of who's leading or driving the lemmings, which does not mean such indispensable information should ever be omitted from reporting of these directly-impacted events.
5
Republicans have short memories. G.W. Bush tried to cut Medicare and was severely burned by the backlash. Seven of ten nursing home residents in Texas are on Medicaid. Are Republicans going to toss granny onto the streets? The CHIP funding for 9 million kids ended in September. Thirteen million adults are about to lose health insurance.
How do pro-life faith filled Republicans square their words with their actions? Matthew 25:31-46 says to take care of the least.
John Kasich: "Now, when you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he's probably not going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small. But he is going to ask you what you did for the poor. You better have a good answer,"
16
Heading toward tax victory? Not so fast. Not a done deal yet. We must resist and revolt. Why not express ourselves through a country-wide work stoppage. There are more of us than them. A general strike to bring the country to a screeching halt. Millions should march to D.C. We refuse to live in an oligarchy and will fight back. 2018 will surely be payback time.
12
All the GOP that voted for handing over vast sums of money to the rich are more than happy to slash money from the most vulnerable of Americans, the elderly. After all, their futures are secure by all the payouts that they get from the big businesses for passing their corporate Christmas gift!!!!
4
The party of oligarchs cuts taxes on the wealthy when they are at record levels of income. What about the three Trillion the government has already borrowed from social security. They want to eliminate healthcare and welfare then let them start with their own government healthcare plan and pensions.
5
I wonder how all the myopic, single issue voters living on Social Security and Medicare, will feel about their heroes in Congress when they find themselves hungry, with no health care? At least they can keep their guns, and avoid abortions...
10
Whatever makes you think voters living on Social Security and Medicare are myopic and believe they have heroes in Congress, or that they have guns and are anti-abortion? I think you are guilty of ageism. I am living on Social Security and Medicare, see NO heroes in Congress among Republicans, and Colorado's Senator Gardner is one of the worst by reminding his fellow Republican Senators to listen to those who fund them, have no guns, and am pro-abortion. Put that in your noggin and think about it young whippersnapper that you are!
Spot the lie:
A: "The tax cut will grow the economy."
-- Paul Ryan
B: "I ran a marathon under three hours."
-- Paul Ryan
4
No one should we pay $1 in student loan debt repayment. Why should students be the chump who pays?
1
Christmas is just around the corner, and the GOP is saying, as did Ebenezer Scrooge, "Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses? Then let them die and decrease the surplus population."
And these are the same people to whom we are supposed to trust our welfare and that of our children? Why do they not serve the public? And why do we allow them to continue to serve?
11
Trump voters are getting what they deserve,more poverty and less justice in the land of the free and the brave(free to dig their own grave and brave by fighting poverty).
4
Let this serve as an excellent lesson in Civics:
How A Bill Becomes A Law
And...why it's really, really important to vote.
Candidates must be closely scrutinized for the work they have done for Voter Constituents as opposed to Donor Constituents.
Watch Senator Jon Tester's video, he can't even read his copy of the tax bill.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/mobile.nytimes.com/2017/12/01/us/politics/h...
2
Wisconsin do your duty, pack ryan (lowercase r intentional) the "policy wonk" off to the peterson (lowercase p intentional) institute in 2018. gop politicians (you get the idea) are the real deplorables.
American taxpayers paid for and expect to receive the medicare and social security that rightfully belongs to them.
6
You've only paid toward Part A and the average SS recipient collects every dollar they contributed (not incl. employer contributions and estimated interest) within three age a half years of drawing Social Security.
I think it's time for another secession from the Union. Let the Republicans keep all the red states; we'll take Washington State (along with Microsoft and Amazon), Oregon, California (along with Silicon Valley and the entire entertainment industry), New York (along with Wall Street), Massachusetts (along with Harvard and MIT), and Vermont. Last year, the prime minister of Canada said he couldn't discuss accepting any U.S. states until they officially seceded. Note he didn't say they woulnd't take them.
5
Your plan leaves you without many military bases or the flyover state volunteers to staff them.
Great idea- but Nevada has to go too!
1
“The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow’s hands.”--Will Rogers
4
My mom is on social security and medicare. I cannot get benefits for at least ten more years and have maxed out every years for 30 years paying into the plan. I have no problem with spending cuts as long as we go across the board and stop the insanity of bigger government programs. We also need to stop paying for bad behavior and lack of personal responsibility. Elderly, sick and disabled people need a safety need if their families cannot care for them, the rest can fend for themselves and live with the decisions they have made over the course of their lives. I have been fortunate to make a lot of money but some of my bad decisions are coming back to haunt me and I will have to work longer than planned to retire in comfort if I can retire at all. This is my fault and my responsibility, not the governments responsibility. Stop with the identity politics and victimization of everyone that is not white.
1
So, you're 55? Which would make your mother around 75. Who's going to hire your mother for a forty hour workweek with benefits?
2
A key to what Americas' future will look like if Republicans maintain their iron grip on government?
Look at any oligarchy, Russia seems to be the current model.
2
More than likely Ryan will privatize Social Security rather than cut it. That way his cronies can drain trillions directly into Wall Street banks. And if you paid into Social Security your entire life, their response and solution to us will be to "pray" and "pay" your SS taxes.
Coming from so called deficit hawks and wealth transfer scolds - Republicans just transferred what little wealth we all have to the greediest at the top adding trillions to the deficit for no other reason.
Too big to tax.
8
Take the drama and liberal politics out of the equation and it become clear that it's is absurd that 14.9% of the economy is removed from the free market in the interest of the nanny state that knows best. Make each of us individually responsible for our retirement (and our education, healthcare, food, shelter and clothing) and let's us freely succeed or fail.
The GOP thinks that they can extort the Dems by passing a massive tax cut and then saying Dems 'have to' help pass legislation waiving pay-go cuts. This either adds to deficit - justifying calls for entitlement 'reform' - or leaves the vulnerable unprotected. This is all justified by a massive give away to corporations and the idle rich. Wow. Well, at least we know what their Plan B is - oops, not economic growth, guess we'll have to cut entitlements. Of course, Plan A was Growth ... so we can cut entitlements!
4
Raising taxes on the advantaged (while less onerous) is similar to cutting spending on programs that mainly benefit the less advantaged. The reverse (lower taxes/increased spending) can be argued as somewhat equivalent too.
The projected path is not that. Cutting taxes and cutting spending on social programs just redirects even more wealth to the advantaged. The appearance of the prospective plan is faith against facts, party loyalty against the citizens, and commitment to past promises against realistic impact to future lives.
Imagine the Republican outrage of raising taxes and increasing social spending as an unacceptable wealth transfer. That is just what their plan does in reverse.
Lowering taxes does not drive investment (jobs, equipment, etc.) ... anticipated demand does. Concentrating wealth in fewer people will just lower demand. The stated .08% per year in economic growth is not worth the annual $100M price tag.
But it is a tough argument to make ... because everyone understands lower taxes and wants to believe it will apply to them. Unfortunately, those that will be hurt have hurdles ... working just to survive, hindrances to vote, and little volume to their voice if the even try to speak up.
Tough to be
2
The Republicans have made a fatal mistake, which shall lead to their demise. The government exists for the commonwealth of the people. A government which fails to act in the best interests of ALL the people, not just the richest of the rich, is doomed.
Beware Republican fat cats. The people will rise up, as they have throughout history, and you shall pay a mighty price. There will be no mercy for you and you shall be granted no quarter.
9
Let's name Ryan's proposal after him, the man who lived on Social Security Survivor Benefits growing up. If this isn't climbing the ladder and pulling it up after you, what is?
Shame on him and all of them. Of course, like their fearless (except for being drafted) leader, they are all shameless. They tsk-tsk about his crassness, but they are cut from the same cloth.
12
The telling point is that Ryan and really all the Trumpistas believe that Medicare is welfare. And for that matter that Social Security is welfare. Despite the historical and legislative evidence to the contrary.
Ryan got his start with that so-called welfare, but apparently lost his soul in the process and now would deny such benefits to others. How ironic, and how shameful!!
7
Later in 2018 we will have a chance to kick the Republicans out of Congress and begin the reversal of their policies. Then, there's the presidency in 2020. If both efforts fail, then we should begin strengthening secession movements on the East and West coasts (to begin with). It will be time to stop the minority rule that works for oligarchs only in this country. No more gerrymandering, voter suppression, no more Electoral College, no more subsidizing of red states by blue states, no more bloated military budgets and stupid wars, etc. It will be tough economically and politically but better than fascism and then eventual revolution and civil war.
10
Yes! I'm in. We are so divided and the electoral college is killing us (East/West Coasts). Reading the articles about the tax plan, and thinking about all the voters from both parties whom this will harm, it absolutely looks like a foretelling of civil unraveling. If not now, then in the future. Those of us who believe in the polar opposite of this tax plan, the opposite of GOP social policies and obsessions (women's reproductive rights), etc. should be allowed to live peacefully without this insanity. When I was 12 I wrote an essay about dividing the U.S. into independent regional entities-- it made absolute sense to me at the time. 30 years on, it still is the obvious answer to this crazy situation. 150M people trying to convince the other 150M to see it their way. This is NOT working.
2
Ok, So, why can't everything the Right Wing does be undone?
I mean, if they are undoing all Obama's good deeds, why not undo their evil and put everything on the right track again?
A concerted effort is needed to get rid of vote rigging through Gerrymandering. We need a rider on the electoral college that will prevent them from doing the insane "appointing" of another loser to the oval office. Then we can return to our Government of The People.
9
Heading toward tax victory? Not so fast. We must resist and revolt. A general work stoppage. There are more of us than them. We are being held hostage by that 30 percent base I am sick and tired of hearing about. Strike. Millions should march to D.C. We refuse to live in an oligarchy, like serfs.
11
Fox news blocked the real details of this tax plan From its viewers and I’m sure will hide the fact that they are going after Social Security and Medicare.
10
MAY SEEK? Expect that they will be raiding all the social programs we CHOSE to support with OUR TAXES that used to Include The FAT CAT 1%s as well. If they continued to pay into Social Security and not get a pass after they hit $150k there would be money to pay back what congress has repeatedly "borrowed", become fully self supporting and have enough left over to provide Medicare for All. It REEKS what REPUBLICANS are doing to our social structure and Country all to feed their own greed as well as the 1%. trump has always been a grafter, but there were a few Republicans who believed in the rule of law, the Constitution, and real fiscal Responsibility as well as some essential social programs. But now?
Apparently every one of them has fully sold out. I despised little Georgie Bush but he did give us Part D for Medicare, but these misanthropes are going to decrease the surplus population by no healthcare or the WAR they are brewing to feed the military industry. How about auditing the Military starting with the Pentagon, wh?!
5
Republicans could choose to cut military spending, but they won’t do that. Better to cut welfare to poor and elderly in their opinion.
1
Everything's temporary gain, the Democrats will reverse all these laws once they get into power like the Republicans did to undo the gains of the Obama era- I know they're salivating . The only thing Republicans can do is now is show how ugly they are, this will be the blueprint from which we work from to make this Republican (any party) ugliness hard to repeat. I'm actually encouraged.
2
I hope this is what happens but the credulity and stupidity of the people that voted for Trump, those people for whom the biggest fail by Trump so far was that he did not yet build that FN wall, dampens my sense of encouragement and leaves me feeling more guarded than optimistic.
1
Social security is paid for by worker contributions. Why do these republicans think they have any right to tamper with it?
10
Because the special treasury notes that hold the trust funds must be repaid from the federal budget when SS payments exceed contributions. In addition, the 14.9% of payrolls that workers and their employers contribute to SS and Medicare represent a big sum excluded from the economy, specifically retirement investment.
The Founding Fathers couldn't have predicted this. Can you imagine? Philadelphia had dirt roads, and people were well-educated and armed. The Constitution sounds so quaint now - "...domestic Tranquility...secure the Blessings of Liberty" That's silly stuff.
Money is God and In God We Trust.
Meanwhile, we have Twitter, Trump, and Right-America and Left-America, and no interpreter for them to communicate (not that they even want to). Different ideological islands, one with alternate-facts and demagogues, the other with an impossible hyper-equality social agenda that never seems to mention infrastructure.
Anyway, taxes are boring. What's the next war? I'm surprised we don't have one yet. Let's issue the invasion command on Twitter.
2
Every singe time the Republicans are empowered with a majority in congress they chip away at the nation's social safety net. Every single time. Suddenly social security becomes an entitlement, welfare is for those who don't deserve it and Medicare is bankrupting the country. Every single time Republicans claim tax cuts for corporate America and the wealthy will rise all boats, people are hurt. They hated FDR for introducing social security and hate the program to this very day. They'll create a larger deficit and then claim the social programs are the cause, when they just gave tax cuts to the people who need it the least. Republicans who aren't wealthy and continue to vote for these people who are enslaved to their donors require some serious education or long term therapy. It's not clear to me how Republican voters are unable to grasp facts. The stock market is at an all time high, corporate America has so much money here and abroad they could begin investment in the nation at any time and don't require additional tax cuts to do it. The windfall in tax cuts will end up in their shareholder's pockets and in bonuses for their CEO's. It will NOT trickle down to the rest of us who need it the most. We KNOW this from past experiences with the same tax policies that have failed before, but each time we get the same story with the same results. Look how we were left after the last Republican president left office. That should be enough but I guess it's not. INSANE !!
11
What we see here was more than predictable. I was not the only mid life human to cry, literally, when the Soviet Union fell apart. Why, you may ask? Because until that nation was born, dedicated to the good of the WOrkers, there was never an inkling of support for seniors or the diabled.
So many Americans turned to Socialism in the 1920's and 30's, Roosevelt knew tha the had to offer a New Deal, Social Security, or the American People would have revolted during the Depression and after had he not advanced those causes.
The Republican Elite hated the New Deal. THey do not care if the crippled, or any other man, woman or child die of hunger in the streets, or any senior citizen, either. THey do not care if they have health coverage. THey do not care if they can not afford to house themselves.
It is time we show them we do not care if they live or die either. In fact, if the GOP all dropped dead tomorrow, the vast majority of Americans would never notice or care.
6
Trump voters will "figure it out"? Har de har har.
They couldn't figure out that they were hapless marks in Trump's 3-card monte game of a campaign,and now we expect them to connect a massive gift to corporations and the wealthy wrapped up as "tax reform" with the damage to follow.
Get real. Fox will instruct the docile and complicit fools that "Trump just saved them from Socialism." They will passively nod and chant,"USA...USA."
8
"Docile and complicit fools" is the best description I've heard of them! A phrase that can be uttered in any company but cuts to the absolute truth. Great choice of words!
1
This is what happens when you abolish the draft and allow gerrymandering.
Few in the Republican Party have ever served their country, in fact, they have spent most of their adult lives serving the rich.
We are Rome, falling to the greed of the wealthy and their lack of ability to defend the poor and the powerless.
Hugh Massengill, Eugene Oregon
7
Thinking I'd better take my social security now and not wait until I'm 7o, eh?
Tonight, at a comforting community circle of musicians, poets and listeners in Amherst Ma the talk was of activism, of focusing altruism to two things: politicians like President Pocahantas and our local soup kitchen.
WE MUST CONJURE UP TRULY DESERVING RIGHTEOUS LEADERS who follow Christ's tenents of mercy and compassion.
Conjure national leaders to feel proud of, to act as role models, who don't leave the 'lower' class out of their nasty little equations nor sneak rights for fetuses into tax bills (among other nefarious inclusions)
My brother and his dentist wife, thrilled with their new grand baby, so called 'middle class', tell me they feel blessed, they have more than everything they need and so, solemnly consider how to transfer a portion of their bounty to those less fortunate and now, severely threatened.
4
You speak of transferring bounty. Presumably, you are referring to voluntary charitable contributions. Placing YOUR money where YOU wish in pursuit of a project, issue or matter of importance to YOU. That is all well and good, and is a matter for debate in another forum. But the government should not be deciding how much to take and where to spend it in a form of forced charity. If you, for instance, don't have the stomach for homelessness, then, by all means, contribute to a shelter or soup kitchen. Bit don't hide behind your elected representatives and take money from my pocket to satisfy your discomfort.
The passage of this republican tax bill is a declaration of war on the middle class and the most vulnerable Americans. With the poisoning of The Affordable Care Act's mandate included, the ACA itself is severely wounded. With this one broadside, republicans have insured that those who have been targets of their reign of terror will come out in droves to the ballot box and end republican rule in the house and senate once and for all in 2018.
4
There must not be any republican historians. Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid were put in place to solve enormous social problems, primarily of the elderly and poor. Seniors were becoming homeless and bankrupt because they couldn't afford both housing and medical treatments. These programs restored their dignity and well being as the US joined other developed countries in taking care of those needing help.
9
They came into being because weak politicians like FDR and Truman had the socialists and communists nipping at their heels during the Depression and they didn't have the guts to tell people "No!"
Can you imagine taxing tuition scholarships earned by undergrads and grad students? Every single Republican except Corker voted yes to that last night. That's how much the Repubs value education in this country. So fewer STEM students here means we can permanently continue to hire our science, tech, math and engineering employees from India/China, etc.
8
Education, like food, shelter, clothing and medical care should go to those who can afford them. That's how free markets function. As far as filling the nation's needs for talented workers, we can open our borders to the highest achievers in our most prestigious universities, according to our needs.
The time for the public to get out and fight this is over. Where were the mass protests? Trump sees this as a big green light for his agenda.
4
You mean that those of us who can't afford healthcare should publicly demand that other people pay for it!?! Count me out. I'll pay my own way or do without.
The "stand on your own two feet" crowd believes in such mythology....except that this is a fantasy that has never existed for as long as homo sapiens have evolved. Banishment meant the certainty of death and that is what all this will do to millions of people in this country.
Along the way all retail business will suffer as less money comes into their cash registers because SS, Medicare are not black holes that money goes into recipients pockets but into grocery stores, chain department stores, drug stores, the medical system, and on and on.
4
Welcome to the aristocratic takeover of America. May we all somehow survive the coming austerity.
5
I paid in last 50 years. It's my money.
No it isn't.
They don't play according to Hoyle.
One Congress can't bind the next.
1
Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown is correct. It is in Republican DNA to cut taxes for the rich and threaten to reduce or privatize Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
7
I don't know why you are saying "even if the tax cut sparks the kind of economic growth..." Put this fantasy to bed. We never needed this tax cut, not when corporations are hiding their cash offshore, and now getting rewarded for doing so. Corporations don't want to hire or lift wages or pay benefits. If they did, they'd do so right now.
We are headed for the dystopian nightmare of science fiction.
7
Who is Paul Ryan trying to appeal to? He's supposed to be a hero of the balanced budget folks, right? They can't be happy.
Cut Social Security and you can kiss seniors goodbye. Marco will have to start over in another state. The young have been persuaded there won't be any Social Security, but they're mostly too idealistic to vote Republican. Some young folks even believe scientists and their apocalyptic stories about climate change.
The jobs aren't coming back from China. In fact. we're about to owe China a lot more money as our debts increase. Minorities have no use for Trump. Same for anyone whose religion makes them a terrorist. People whose families have been blocked from entering, or who are in danger of being deported will not be voting Republican.
Heck, even home builders and folks who work for H&R Block will have an axe to grind. So who's left? I don't think you can win an election with just the ultra-religious, the billionaires and the gun club.
4
Cut spending on the military! We don't need to police the world and protect those European countries who spend their money on free education and healthcare instead of their own military.
4
"But Democrats and their allies — and even some usual Republican allies — complain that Republicans are dishonest not to debate changes in spending and tax cuts at the same time, as the Simpson-Bowles commission did."
Republicans dishonest? I'm shocked, shocked.
1
After passing this tax bill it should be obvious to all that the Republicans don't care one iota about regular working class men and women. Following this line of thought I don't understand how any Republican Senators can get re-elected, let alone those in purple states like Pennsylvania, Florida, Wisconsin, Missouri, Ohio, and Nevada, after throwing their constituents under the bus in favor of their wealthy donors.
4
If you are going to report on the cost of "entitlements" in the context of the deficit, you have an obligation to report the revenue streams that fund them, as well as the level of the trust funds that finance them. Social Security and Medicare are not adding to the deficit, the Republicans borrowing from the trust funds is masking the larger problem.
5
One Midwestern commenter stated that the Republican Senators must not know any of the hard pressed people whom she knows who literally count pennies to make ends meet. I agree. The night of the debate on the tax bill, Orrin Hatch avoided Senator Sherrod Brown's legitimate question about CHIP (Children's Health Insurance Program) by launching into a tirade that "we are going to do CHIP," but "we don't have money anymore," and not "wanting to spend billions and billions and trillions of dollars to help people who won't help themselves - won't lift a finger - and expect the federal government to do everything." Hatch then snidely said he wished Brown would start thinking of others.
Hatch's hyperbole was astonishing in its dishonesty for resurrecting Reagan's welfare queen fiction. Much like Leona Helmsley, he discards the "little people" as worthless. Although Wall Street billionaires who bleat for more money and trust fund babies certainly come to mind when I think of people who don't do much for themselves, that does not describe the lower income people I deal with regularly through volunteer work I do.
Although the Republicans in Congress have photo ops taken at soup kitchens, I guarantee that not one of them has spent any substantive time with their lower income constituents. I wish they could be required to spend a week shadowing a middle to lower income family before taking office. I think they might would come away chastened by their hubris, ignorance and cruelty.
24
Would you have wealthy people help poorer people until no one is wealthy? There is a limit and then you must do for yourself.
Please keep in mind that every! millionaire member of Our Congress and! their spouses will be on the public dole until they draw their last breath. They have a retirement package that pays them and! their spouse a lifelong pension that includes gold plated, no questions asked, no cost too great for the taxpayer to bear health, dental! and vision! care, again until they draw they and! their spouse draw their last breaths. They'll be no cuts to this plus all the other perks they give themselves- hairdressers, gyms, travel, cars, chauffeurs etc. It would be interesting/infuriating to know just how much We the Taxpayers pay each year to support current and retired members of Congress in the style to which they've become accustomed to at Our expense. What's the price tag for all of that?
17
If Congress wants to cut entitlements, this is where to start. Welfare reform should begin with cutting the benefits that Congress voted for themselves, and have all members, past and present, rely on Medicare and Social Security like the rest of American citizens.
5
Don’t forget they also pay off harassment claims using public money.
4
Then the payroll taxes we pay for Social Security and Medicare will become a regressive income tax.
9
And there you have it. They have been chomping at the bit to get their grubby little hands on our safety nets. They've even convinced their followers that Social Security and Medicare will run out of money unless they make necessary cuts to these programs. You simply cannot convince them otherwise. I'm strongly considering moving to another country. I feel like I've been betrayed here. Mostly by people I used to consider friends. Though we've had our political differences over the years, this just feels like getting kicked in the gut with every evil move the Republicans make. Listening to my Republican so called friends talk about finally having a president who's getting something done makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time. How did we get here? Somebody make it stop!
19
I wish that people would stop calling organizations and committees that have one or two right wing democrats and the rest hard line Republicans "Bipartisan".
12
Now we, the 80% who were opposed to the tax bill, must stop this madness. Cutting the safety net is just another way to fatten the very rich at our expense. Mr. Ryan personally doesn't need Medicaid or even Social Security, it seems, so nobody else should? This will endanger us all. Like Drumpf & Co.'s other lies, slashing our true entitlements -- which we pay for! -- will not make America "great again" -- on the contrary, we will see the further decline of our once-great nation.
We must organize and raise our voices loudly and immediately. All of us protesting here must take our opposition to the streets, if necessary, and surely to our representatives.
13
The taxation-damage GOP leadership threatens to cause the private sector is so blatantly-obvious, that I think Democratic leadership will, easily, rollback the private sectors higher tax rates in the plan when they regain the majority of the Congress and our next White House.
Since Democratic leadership under President Obama wanted to carefully close some corporate loopholes to pay for breaks for smaller-corporations and businesses, I think Democratic leadership will keep those breaks for smaller businesses, and will use the federal revenue from closing corporate loopholes for the largest of corporations to pay for the breaks.
There is no damage that GOP leadership has done or can cause that Democratic leadership cannot undo. Have faith!
11
One can argue that by voting Republicans into both chambers of congress and the White House, this is what the majority of American citizens want. After all, these are all democratically elected officials, and they have always made known their stance on tax and entitlements. The majority of voters wanted to pay less tax, and there weren't enough voters that would be hurt by cuts in entitlements to keep the Republicans from being elected. So what if the majority of the benefit goes to the 1%, as long as I get a few hundred dollars more to spend ? This is the cruel fact of a capitalistic democracy. If you ask somebody who is comfortably in middle-class whether entitlements should be cut to pay for tax cuts, they would tell you no because it is the politically correct thing to say. How they vote though speaks loud and clear what they really think. Why should we give up that Mediterranean holiday to pay for somebody else's hip replacement ?
Interestingly, the French thinks very differently. I once suggested to a friend who owns a winery in Burgundy that she could incorporate in Switzerland and save a ton on taxes. She gave me such a dressing down for insulting her. Liberté, fraternité et égalité. The last two elements are missing in America.
13
I have yet to hear a compelling - or even coherent - argument on why this obsession with cutting social programs is supposed to be good for the country...or what people dependent on these programs are supposed to do, besides suffer.
13
I wish these Republicans would spend 2 hours in a local social security office waiting room. Why is it so abhorrent for them to allow people a small amount of dignity? Instead their attitude reeks of Ebenezer Scrooge.
2
What a blown opportunity to serve the public good, the Us economy and real stimulus...there is no talk about investingbetrays in rehabilitating US infrastructure. Even Trump claimed that thewas his priority during the campaign.
Nothing would bring jobs, wages, growth faster than rebuilding roads, energy grid, telecom, , b,airports & transportation. Competing in a global economy requires that more than a 20% corporate tax rate.
Pandering to billionaire donors betrays the national interest.Shame.
8
Why is this a surprise? This was the end game from the Reagan era.
The only thing the GOP will spend money on is the military and they will start wars to do that.
The reps and senator's "safety net" is that they believe they will be cared for by the corporations and the 1%er's, of which the Kochs of the world are already looking to cut them loose.
The final step, the change in the motto: "In the Rich we trust"
My only hope, a second civil war.
6
My old econ professor once made an interesting comment. He said, "To solve America's financial problems we can do three things: 1. Raise Taxes, 2. Cut Spending, or 3. Borrow More Money."
Republicans will continue to cut taxes and raise military spending, but will never achieve entitlement reform. Democrats will continue expanding social spending while avoiding tax raises. And we will continue to borrow money until we're broke.
The question isn't whether the U.S. will go under financially, it's when. My prediction: 2020s and 2030s when Social Security trust fund runs out and Medicare/Medicaid expenses start shooting through the roof.
5
The government did borrow more money--from the Social Security Trust Fund!
1
This is what we get when hate is the overriding agenda item in the national zeitgeist. The Republican leadership uses Trump's racism, sexism and xenophobia as distractions that allow them to pass pernicious legislation in the dark of night and Americans are too wrapped around the axel on side issues to see what's really happening.
10
Having lived in a dictatorship, I have the same feeling again. This time a group (Republicans) have taken the power and are doing whatever they want regardless of people's need or the harm they may cause to the country. Their control over the country seems unchallengeable and beyond the ability of people to change.
14
If they want to cut spending, how about taking a look at the US military budget, which is more than half our national budget, and is greater than that of the next 10 or so countries COMBINED. This, in combination with our depleted diplomatic corps is not only absurd, it's dangerous, particularly with a dottard as commander-in-chief.
13
I read the vast majority of the article and its relentless attacks by my Democrat friends on how scurrilous the Republicans are for increasing the deficit. It was simply amazing how quickly the Democrats have become so fiscally responsible all of a sudden now that their party is out of the White House! Forgotten amongst their frivolity and enthusiasm is the fact that during Obama's term in office, the deficit increased 86% and by over 9 trillion dollars. That would cause memory loss to any Democrat, I offer humbly. Can't blame them.
2
Continued deficit spending is a serious problem. The national debt doubled under each of the two previous presidents.
Meanwhile, the economy has recovered and is growing. Unemployment is down to 4.1%. So remind me again, why are we doing a tax cut now?
It's not raining today. It is time to pay our bills.
1
The national debt increased by Obama during his entire two terms was actually less than $1 trillion. See https://www.thebalance.com/national-debt-under-obama-3306293.
1
The disaffected voters who flocked to Trump are the biggest losers in this tax cut for corporations that will lead to cuts in Social Security and Medicare.
5
Republicans to Main Street Americans — Drop Dead
Republican politicians are counting on traditionally skimpy mid-term election voter turnout to keep the lid on unrich outrage. Wait till Main Street discovers that Corpoville and the mega-rich have no intention of raising wages, onshoring factories or returning money stashed in offshore banks. They’ll take all that lovely money gained from corporate and personal tax cuts, thank you very much, then re-stash the money in offshore banks.
If the deficit gets too large even for Republicans, they’ll cut Main Street’s Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Who cares about Main Street? They should have saved money when they were young so they’d have money when they were old. As for Medicare and Medicaid, they’ve outlived their usefulness, let ‘em die and stop wasting resources.
4
Precisely how the GOP views the rest of us!!!
The elderly in particular are going to suffer, but the Trumpets even in states with large numbers of retirees do not care—they have their perks from Congressional benefits or their wealth stashed abroad and the rest if us can just slink off and die prematurely, leaving more for them to wage war with.
1
I did not think I would live to see the downfall of the United States, but I think, at the age of 74, I am about to see just that. We stopped teaching civics and analytical thinking years ago, and we are seeing the end result. Ronald Reagan and company started putting out the mantra years ago that you could have everything you wanted and not have to pay for a functional government in the process. We are about to become a third world country. When people talk about getting together and voting our current cruel government out, they forget that the game has been rigged against us with voter suppression, gerrymandering and increasingly stacked courts.
If we reach the point where enough people are so desperate that they have nothing to lose, and as billionaire Nick Hanauer predicts, start forming mobs and bringing out the pitchforks, the rule of law will be gone and will not be easily restored. The United States of America has had a pretty good run, but we've cooked up a lethal stew of profit worship, long term racism, tendency toward war and a lack of compassion for those not in our particular class that is likely to be the fatal poison that brings us down.
15
I used to think if we ducked our heads and stood real still, we could survive four years of Trump and two years of a Republican Congress. Now I don't. Republicans have no problem killing off their constituents. None. If we don't want an end of the United States over our lifetimes, we need TO VOTE THEM OUT IN 2018. Code red.
5
How would Social Security be cut exactly? The amount paid into it, the Republicans would say sorry, we are keeping that?
3
Few of us have been following this because it is rarely discussed up front.
Add to the attempt to shrink and privatize a devitalized SSI and Medicare for instance and taking it is the increased taxes planned for 2018 on those with incomes from $22,000- $26.000.
Yes, that's currently a fact.
2
The far right rich have declared war on the middle and working classes. Their GOP pawns in the Congress and in the White House ignore the desires and welfare of the majority in fear of displeasing their few wealthy masters. God help us if the masses who usually stay home for elections don't come out next November to defend this nation, because if the GOP is not soundly rebuked, the Gerrymandering will just keep increasing until democracy is crushed under the heel of oligarchy.
5
At times like these, I surely wish that we lived in a parliamentary democracy where a vote of no confidence could be taken and a new election held in a few weeks.
8
What I don't get is how any of those who voted to enact this proposed legislation think that they or someone close to them won't be affected. Societies exist as a means to support larger groups of people with some degree of equity while measures such as this constitute a very real attack on that premise.
As a people and a nation we have existed long enough to know this is a failed strategy and those who tout it are on the take. Not a smart move for any legislator. A lot of dead trees will be felled and fresh saplings stripped in November of next year.
4
In 2009, with control of both houses of Congress and White House, the Democrats studiously avoid taking any bold action. The Republicans respond with scorched earth and an all-out effort to energize opposition and regain control Washington. The press notices this in passing.
In 2017, with control of both houses of Congress and White House, the Republicans go hog wild with an fiscally irresponsible and deceitfully advertised tax cut. The Democrats wring their hands, tear their hair but actually accomplish next to nothing.
This sort of asymmetry has been a central dynamic of American politics for the past two decades. Both parties, for different reasons, deny it, and the press keeps its collective head buried in the sand to ignore the contradiction, which does not fit its standard playbook of symmetric "gridlock."
1
I have worked since I was 16 years old. My father had to explain to me what and why the deductions in my first paycheck were about. I remember him telling me that in the very long run I'd be getting back those deductions, minus taxes, and I would be grateful as he was. Now at 60 years old, having been on disability (which took forever to be approved) the last few years due to cancer and other ailments, I hope I die before I receive a notice in the mail telling me my benefits have been reduced or worse, nullified. Because I'd be homeless. On the streets. Without medical care. I couldn't live like that.
7
1st: congressional salaries have to be cut in half (and that's still a lot)
2nd: no more medical coverage for congress; let them buy their own
3rd: no retirement pay because we need to limit terms to eight years for the Congress, twelve for the senate (for example).
We the people need a national referendum. I feel misrepresented. Shouldn't we be dumping tea (or something) into Boston Harbor? (with apologies to the good people of Boston).
6
In just about every comment here, people complain about the government. They are corrupt, wasteful, discriminatory, careless, not compassionate, etc. However, some people want the government to be responsible for things like our healthcare and retirement. To me, that is the LAST thing I want, for a government headed by these people in Congress and the Executive branch to take care of me.
It is all a matter of how best to govern. Providing jobs and an incentive to work is how this country became great. Abraham Lincoln said “you cannot help the poor by destroying the rich” and those words still apply today.
The question of how best to govern a capitlist society without driving it into socialsm is a difficult one but what I saw during the past democratic administration was frightening. The change we now see may not be perfect but is clearly a step in the right direction.
When the pendulem stops swinging the clock stops!
2
Where do you get your news from? Fox, the WSJ, Breitbart?
I have no idea what you saw that was so frightening, but clearly you and I didn't see the same thing.
1
In the United States, it does not appear that politicians understand that they also undermine the existence of the rich and their politicians. You country looks more and more like an advanced, but failed state. Its embarrassing.
5
Erland:
And one can only marvel at how Putin managed to accomplish this in merely one year.
Watch out, Norway. He'll be coming for you next.
1
The first place to cut government spending is with salaries and all the health, welfare, and pension benefits for McConnell and Ryan's colleagues in the Senate and House. These "deadbeats" have been wasting taxpayer money for way too long. We can start with cutting salaries, reducing the compensation rate to the minimum hourly wage, and paying them for hours actually worked.
6
As if the details of the Republican "tax reform" legislation did not yet make clear who Republicans really care about, and who Republicans really represent, they will make even more clear their contempt for working people and middle-class people by "cutting spending". Just watch which spending they feel needs to be cut, now that they've given $1.4 Trillion to the already very wealthy and major corporations. Watch, remember, and vote.
4
I have been writing and calling my Republican Senator Todd Young (R) from NW Indiana constantly. He proudly sent out an email telling us that this tax break would help the middle class and small businesses. He neglected to say that it would provoke an immediate cut to funding for Medicare. He also forgot to say that there would be no medical deductions for medical expenses.
I am a hospice volunteer who is a companion to people in the last days of their life. I read that 60% of hospice patients are on some form of Medicaid. That also is being cut. So now, its acceptable for those who are dying to be put out on the street?
It seems that Congress and Trump are determined to hurt people while making sure that they and their wealthy supporters get more money. Is this truly what America wants? How corrupt can we get and survive as a democracy? How much destruction will happen before people say, "ENOUGH"?
7
The states these comments come from give me grave concern. A lot of us live in states where our legislators will vote against these attempts, but what about all the people who don't read newspapers and don't watch real news in places where the Paul Ryans of the world get re-elected and the semi-decent lawmakers are dropping like flies? When will those people wake up and stop voting for those who do not represent their interests? If we don't turn some of those states in 2018, then our future is lost.
4
The Republicans have calculated that the major effects of their immoral and exploitative tax bill will not be felt until after the 2018 and 2020 elections. If Democrats win seats in those elections, Republicans will then blame Democrats for the devastating results of the Republican plan they just passed. They are counting on the public not connecting the dots - we must ensure that the Republicans don't get away with it.
5
Are TEA party members happy with the tax increase they are getting from Republicans to pay for the Giga-tax cut for the wealthy?
Republicans aren't done yet. In addition to leaving us all in debt and without health care, they want to take away our Social Security (by privatizing it), Medicare/Medicaid, and America the Beautiful by polluting it and giving it all away to the rich. And of course, with a higher deficit they will want to cut taxes for their patrons yet again.
Instead of dealing with tax giveaway entitlements to the rich that do not need it, they want to take away life and health saving benefits we pay for with taxes (we do not evade paying taxes like the wealthy do) and through low wages that subsidize the rich. That's the Republican way.
This time they went way too far. Hopefully voters will overwhelmingly get Democrats back into power and demand that the deficit be brought under control by reinstating the 90% tax rates on the perversely rich. See how they like it!
2
The $1.5 trillion tax cut for the very rich isn't quite complete, but our visionary Republican stalwarts already talk about cutting Social Security and Medicare. After all, this deficit spending is really, really worrisome, and we can only Make America Great Again by undoing The New Deal and growing our plutocracy while impoverishing the rest of us. That way American will become truly great, just like Russia!
2
This should be no surprise to anyone who can decipher the language of "dog whistle". Trump said on the campaign trail, "I'm going to reduce the size of the administrative state."
So yes, social safety net cuts are next.
Voters will soon learn that when you beg for tax cuts, you will end up with more "cuts" than tax cuts. But keep whining about Hillary's email.
2
So, the real goal of the GOP stealth tax cuts was really to start the dismantling of the social contract by adding an astounding debt to the deficit. Get ready for the right wing mantra that Social Security and Medicare are "welfare" programs for the poor and middle class. Rep. Ryan has shown his hand and it is time for the "little people" to rise up and claim back what they have paid into over a life-time.
1
1. Gradually raise the age for receiving social security to 70, say over a 20 year period. This would save money and more closely reflect the benefit vs life expectancy when soc sec was created.
2. Hospice and palliative care for people with terminal conditions – not critical care (provided to people whose lives can be saved.) We waste half our healthcare budget on people in their last six months of life.
These two things would save the system.
2
Which terminal conditions are you talking about? Cancers which might be cured?
I know a man in his mid to late 40's who's survived stage four melanoma for eight years with successful experimental treatments. Are you suggesting that a 65-year-old should be denied the same treatments because he or she is on Medicare? Are we really going to set up Palin's fallacious "death panels"?
When there is a scarce resource, it must be rationed. Yes, there will be some form of rules-based medicine, as there is in other countries. Experimental drugs that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and help very few people cannot be afforded by the system. Eventually, it will collapse and hurt everyone.
Based on my layman's understanding of these matters, it seems clear that cutting Social Security (reducing the purchasing power of Social Security dollars over time) is already foreshadowed in the Senate tax bill, which specifies that the adjustment of tax brackets will be governed by Chained Consumer Price Index. Using chained CPI, the rate at which tax brackets will increase to reflect inflation will be less than it would be using the current standard CPI. Using Chained CPI to determine Social Security annual cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) has frequently been suggested in recent years, and even President Obama would have gone along with this--but only as one part of a "grand bargain" for management of the nation's finances (the GOP refused to play, not wanting an equitable and balanced bargain). Chained CPI would reduce Social Security COLAs, and the compounding effect over several years could be quite significant, especially since the Fed has made clear that it is aiming for a higher rate of inflation. Higher inflation, of course, is a way of reducing the real cost of the national debt. But it's also a stealthy means of siphoning away the purchasing power of your Social Security dollars if the annual COLAs don't keep up with your real loss of purchasing power. I'd be interested in hearing some economists or Social Security experts opine on this.
2
I think I have been quite tolerant of years of Republican attacks on Americans and the policies that kill us. Now I think the threat to Democrats is more real than ever before. The weapons they bear are laws and policies and we must now defend ourselves. Democrats need to better network and assemble armies of lawyers to drag the Republicans and their lethal laws through the courts to vanquish them and reverse policies, even by promoting class action lawsuits like those utilized by various states AG's in the fight against Tobacco Companies. Short of violence which I do not condone and will never resort to, I fully support an onslaught of law against Republicans even now before their policies see the light of day outside the halls of darkness and despair. The Republicans are using Congressional Law making and President signatures along with a justice system predominantly Republican that supports them, even for harassing and time consuming frivolous social issue cases as silly as selling wedding cakes. Don't you see what the Republicans are doing? They are trying to kill us with laws and preoccupying the courts simultaneously. Lets get to the major issues and fight law with law. Deny the Newt Gingrich Radical right their war of weapons. Where are all the enterprising lawyers on the Democrat side? The Republicans have theirs. Schumer is a lawyer. How does he let this get by our party. No guts, no glory. Fight. If I hear one more stupid Democrat say they want "Bipartisanship".....
4
The next step is to go after entitlements to reduce the deficit. Republican strategy seems to be to continue to making it more difficult for many of those who would vote against them to exercise their voting rights, and to insure as much as possible that any pain resulting from cuts in services and benefits will be felt by those least likely to vote them out of office.
3
Mr. Ryan has devoted his entire efforts year after year to undo social security and Medicare.
2
The tax cut, if passed, will be a net political loss for the Republicans: they already have the votes of those who benefit in any material way. They had the votes in 2016 of many of those who will be hurt in the next three years or who will get minimal tax cuts.
Do Republicans really think that tens of millions of voters will forget their recent bills to cut health care benefits?
The public's approval ratings for the health and tax bills were both dismal. The tax cut bill has minimal potential to noticeably boost economic growth.
Taxes, wages and salaries, health care expenses, and social security are front-and-center financial issues for an overwhelming majority of the electorate.
Republicans in Congress who think they will be retained in office or remain in the majority by passing their reverse Robin Hood agenda must be bedazzled by the prospect of their post-congressional sinecures. Voters in Kansas and Oklahoma happy with the outcomes of Republican policies?
Not so much. Add in the electoral penalty seen all over the map already in 2017 on account of the Trump Maladministration.
Republicans are hard at work making themselves into a durable minority.
1
The Republicans must have absolute confidence that gerrymandering, voter suppression, GOP control of electronic voting apparatus and their well know ability to steal close elections will save them from the wrath of the voters next November. If the Trump Tax Scam wasn't enough to seal their fate, cutting Social Security and Medicare, two programs that contribute not one dime to the debt or defficit, to pay for their massive giveaway to the richest of the rich will ensure they are wiped out at the polls. Even the angry old white people who vote Republican won't stand for cuts to the programs they depend on.
1
Only when Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell are booted out of office by informed, fair-minded, and thoughtful voters and replaced with honest, fair-minded, and thoughtful leaders will the majority of Americans regain the rights and freedoms that are promised in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States of America.
Why isn't the media headlining words like "Losers" "Exploitation"and "Class warfare" "Slashed funding for communities, education and healthcare ?
Using words such as "Victory" and "Winners" in the headlines is covering up the travesty these Republicans have committed on this nation.
4
Transfer payments, subsidies, entitlements, etc., are out of control. They are an inefficient way of redistribution and generally used to get votes and discourage work. Previous generations created opportunities for people to help themselves...modern practice is to see how many people can be supported by the 20% that pay 90% of the taxes. Of course those producers are loathed by liberal politicians and the media. Bill Clinton was a welcome relief when he introduced "welfare to workfare". Give people an opportunity not a free ride.
1
History always repeats itself - April 19, 1775 to September 3, 1783 ( over unpopular tax schemes) and July 14, 1786 to November, 1799 (over debt & unpopular tax schemes) - beginnings of the USA & post-monarchy France, respectively. I'm not advocating violence, but a national renewal of the principals this country was founded on and earned by the 99%.
1
it is stupid to believe, and dishonest to assert, that tax cuts to the wealthy and to corporations wil create jobs and raise wages. it hasn't happened in the past and won't now. ryan and ayn rand run this miserable country. a pox on ryan and his collaborators. May they suffer beyond any relief.
3
Republicans just cut the power to the third rail. Now, if you want that power back on, you will need to pay for it. I believe that is called blackmail. And if the middle class refuses? They will dismantle the rail. Forcing more people into poverty. Forcing more people to have to work into their 80's and 90's. Forcing more people to not be able to get mental health and substance abuse treatment. Forcing more women into the workforce, leaving their children with inadequate child care. Forcing more residents into nursing homes back into unsafe environments with little in the way of appropriate care. But the rich will get wealthier. The corporations will see huge profits. And the "base" will cheer it all on. They think it is going to push them back up the pyramid once again. Hopefully they will see the pyramid's base is getting wider and wider. So they are going sideways, not up. But there will always be minorities to kick around. Except those minoroties are slowly becoming majorities.The idiocy of the Republicans is the pendulum has already gone way past the equilibrium point of "fairness" before tax cuts. They have assured the pendulum will reach the conservative extreme. And the result will be push back by they masses. Resulting in undoing everything they have done. And then they will whine taxes are too high and the cycle will start anew. Hard to look for support from a constituency you are stabbing in the back.
1
Capitalists assume that capitalism will ultimately solve all problems, both social and economic.
Not so. We must remember that 50% of the population fall on the left downward side to the Bell shaped curve. That 50% needs varying degrees of social support in the form of entitlement programs.
The fact that we Americans have reached 2017 and not provided constitutional rights to these medical and health programs is a result of our selfishness.
It's time for America to permanently legislate these safety net programs to care for those who, by birth, fall on the less advantaged side of the Bell shaped curve!
3
The U.S. is 37th out of 40 in health and longivity among industrialized countries in the world. Doesn't sound so good, does it?
60-65% of the country appears to be aghast at what is happening. Will these folks get out and vote in 2018 and 2020? If so, this overreach, combined with the despicable Trump could actually signal the end of greedy Repubilcan rule. The key is for all Democrats, liberals, progressives, & independents to support the Democrat at all levels. Concerns over infighting and ideological purity must be dropped, andy temptaion to vote 3rd party or sit out must be avoided - any D, from Bernie Sanders to Joe Manchin or Doug Jones, is preferable to any R.
1
I don't remember anything about "We the corporation" agreed to on July 2, 1776. Am afraid for our democracy and hope our younger generations will see through the smokescreens of injustice and vote out any electable politician who puts personal gain over we the people. Paul Ryan has forgotten his governments safety net that helped him during trying times. He married into money. He like Romney has distain for less fortunate Americans. Jeff Flake wants public image of an ethical man while when it comes down to brass tacks is a hollow shell. John McCain showed some spine with his healthcare concerns, perhaps because he is so close to high need healthcare himself, but by joining the tax giveaway to least needy, his legacy will be closer to savings and loan schemer than maverick for the people. General Flynn lying about his contact with enemies of our country yet collect his big government paychecks and hold his head high in public without outward shame is appalling and a disgrace to our veterans.
4
California and New York should exit the Union and become independent countries, run democratically. At least we could save part of the country that way.
1
To all of Trump supporters Here it comes, the Trump/GOP Bait and Switch.
You think you got were tax reductions for you and keep your Medicare and Social Security intact.
What Mr. Trump and the GOP really give you is minimal personal tax cuts for the average worker, massive tax cuts for Corporations and the Upper 1% with looming massive cuts to your Medicare and Social Security.
2
Quick, NYT, another feature about how Trump voters feel! How do they feel about Passthrough partnership tax reductions and tax breaks for investment funds in mortgages? What’s their take on reducing taxes for K1 partnerships in oil production? And, while we’re at it, since they feel so misunderstood, what’s their empathy for us, on the other side, in the blue states, who are losing state and local tax deductions? For teachers - I assume are also elite- enemies of Trump voters, who prefer home schooling based on the Bible- who now won’t get a tax break for buying books for students, how do Trump voters feel about parents no longer being able to write off college tuition for kids, etc etc etc. please elucidated us how Trump voters feel about all of this .
1
I have a fantasy
January, 2018 no one shows up to work. No one across our nation. We stay home for about a week, maybe longer. We place a giant spike, jammed into this elites' wheel fortune, bringing it all down to a halt costing 'them' billions.
I know, in our dreams.
1
I'm terrified. Living at 150% of the poverty level on Social Security as the only income, what can I do if they cut it and/or cut into Medicare? Medicaid picks up my Medicare part B. but they're cutting Medicaid too.
My grandmother raised a family through the depression and the New Deal and she spoke of the depression until she died in the early 1970's. But the New Deal, saved our family, And set us on a path forward.
I wasn't able to get a degree but as a single mom, I saw to it both my children did. Now I worry for their futures too though both are gainfully employed. And what of my grandchildren?
We can't grow as a country if we continue to hollow out the middle class and crush the poor on the neck with out boots
I don't have any faith at all that these tax cuts will do anything significant for the economy, jobs or a future for America as a whole. We've been down this road before and we know where it leads. Broken promises and passing the buck to blame on the other party. Why do Republicans do this, over and again? They scream no deficit spending ! While Democrats are in office. Then they spend like drunken sailors, largely on tax cuts designed to feed the top tiers. They appear monstrously greedy and I hope they deserve to lose their jobs.
2
There are many of us retirees who depend almost entirely on the Social Security checks we receive. We have pared our expenses considerably. We budget. We are not moochers. We need those checks to survive. I might have to go live with one of my children. Under these drastic financial straits, I would have to give up my charitable volunteering for which I need my car. Fortunately, I do not have any major health problems. For the elderly with high usage of Medicare benefits, they could die without the expensive medicines they take daily. I am lucky. I take a vitamin D gel cap and an aspirin daily as the only two recommendations my doctor makes. I see
him twice a year. What about the millions of type 2 diabetic who need insulin, the millions who have lost kidney function and require costly dialysis to survive? Those people are not lazy. What about all the veterans who now reside in nursing homes and cannot tell you what day it is? Many people in nursing homes are covered by Medicaid and must surrender all of their Social Security to the nursing home. Nursing homes will also face a crisis. Where will those elderly people go if the nursing homes refuse to keep them?
4
The new tax bill is a major achievement for Trump. As with most revolutionary laws it will hurt some but most Americans will benefit.
Cruel, cold, selfish. Instead of the golf courses, Trump and his ilk ought and need to spend ONE Sunday visiting a Memory Care center, as an example, to witness the vast and increasing number of citizens, and their families, to see the struggles and pain of real Americans faced with HUGE losses of care and hard earned dollars to provide help for those we love who are in need. (It would much cost more for our family to keep our Mom home and without the basic mental health program she now receives). Our parents worked hard and honesty their whole lives, and we are in jeopardy, with the risk of running out of funds. That worry impacts my mental health daily with the thoughtless, rushed, unbalanced discussion, and heaven forbid implementation, of this cruel, cold, selfish bill. If these selfish elitists and takers could only put themselves in our shoes and witness the real truth. Those who voted for this are putting our present, (which since this travesty of an election)has NOT been a gift) and future in dire jeopardy.
2
I think the republican leadership are a bunch of criminals. They joined the government so they could destroy it from within. The EPA, education, health care, the courts, and now social security.
It's diabolical.
Curiously, incredibly, there are no strong democratic voices to help voters make sense of all of this.
They'd better get their act together, and quickly.
2
Contrary to the GOP's (and this article's) assertion, "Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the entitlement programs that are [NOT] driving up spending." The bloated and unnecessary military budget is the culprit in that regard. That is where cuts should be made, but the militarists in the Senate and House, funded by those who profit from war, will never do that.
3
Trickle down has been proven to be a fraudulent economic model. It hasn't worked in the 40 years since it's reissue by Reagan.
It is designed to appear an earnest attempt at a helpful theory, but was only created to provide "plausible deniability" for con men and charlatans.
These fraudsters use it as a tool to loot the country under the feigned guise of an earnest attempt to better the lives of Americans.
It is obviously a ruse.
It seems that Congress needs to explain how they can keep pushing their plan that has only succeeded in making the 1% richer while weakening the rest of the country to the point that it could be "drowned in the bathtub".
It's obvious that the country is in danger, and that these people are destroying America.
2
I'm not surprised. And for all of this I blame the Democrats, not Trump as endless commenters persist in doing. Why do I blame the Democrats? For insisting on running such a weak unpopular candidate that managed to lose to the likes of Trump. For continuing to endlessly engage in identity politics. For completely disrespecting middle- America and it's values, driving many to vote Republican or not at all. This is what the Democrats brought on this country. Thanks ever so much people!
3
Please stop the circular firing squad and blaming HRC. I'd say blame Bernie, Stein, Johnson and those who supported them, but then I'd be doing the same thing as you.
Why not look at Putin and Fox News instead? The lies, distortions and disinformation spread before and throughout the campaign assured HRC's loss in the electoral college. As you know, she won the popular vote.
1
Ryan calls Social Security and Medicare "entitlements"—a deeply mistaken characterization. They are both insurance funds, into which I and my employers paid for over 50 years. Woe betide the party that abrogates the insurance contract for which we paid.
Every time I contact Senator Rubio's office on this issue in conjunction with the obscene deficit for which he has voted, I receive his stock response: the "tax cut" (welfare for the wealthy) will help the middle class. I'm a senior in the middle class, and, mark my words, seniors will not forgive or forget the politicians who welsh on our insurance payments.
4
This is why the Democrats must retake the House in 2018. There are no guarantees, even with a "wave" election. All of next year must be spent educating the public at whatever level necessary about the robbery in this bill, and about how the resulting deficit will be used as an excuse to take even more away from them.
At least Social Security payments go right back into the economy; people spend that money on necessities. Tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy go into savings or get stashed overseas.
4
If the GOP cuts Social Security and Medicare, town hall meetings should become very interesting. I know one thing... the boomers that voted for Trump and the GOP, even though they are older now, still have enough energy and gumption to take it to the streets if they are betrayed. Our generation was raised on protest and raising holy heck in general and we still have a few good years left.
Of course. there’s a lot of us boomers that didn’t vote for Trump or the GOP, and we’ll be glad to remind those boomers that did vote for Trump what a bunch of know-nothings they were in 2016.
2
Boomers born between 1950 and 1953 lean Democrat while those born later do not. See http://blog.csa.us/2016/04/seniors-comprise-biggest-voting-block.html.
1
You get what you vote for. Did people who voted for Trump really think he wasn't going to look out for himself first? Millionaires in congress who count on billionaire donors really have the plight of the common man at heart? In the real world, a place we seldom visit, do we really think this tax bill isn't helping wealthy people on the Right and The Left? Our wealthy representatives just broke the Piggy Bank and we their beloved Middle Class,as they tell it, will have to carry the burden of their folly. While we wait for the next shoe to drop in the Russia Reality Show the Right is fleecing the audience. The tepid fight put on by The Left should make their wealthy donors sleep easier at night.
No doubt the GOP donor class will have focus group messages in 2018 telling how the Trump admission and tax cut has made American stronger. If thats so why the need to cut entitlements. They have just made private school tuition tax free - but tax public school taxes. They have ripped up Obama care with no replacement, my my SALT taxes to cover indigent health care will be taxed - but policy holder costs will increase. Those who get health insurance from the employer will get it tax free - those of us on our own or in Medicare will be taxes every penny - even though we contribute 1.6% of our salaries for 50-years. Remember when Bush promised a lock box for social security - well that surplus paid for Iraq and Afghanistan. And ultra wealthy GOP donors refuse to pay it back,This tax bill tax graduate student stipends, but makes private school tuition exempt. Never has a political party pulled a nastier double cross - but it the Trump years.
2
I no longer have the ability to feel empathy towards those who have repeatedly voted for the GOP who will gut the safety nets they rely upon. They have been warned over and over again yet they did not listen. I will help those in need in my own way but not those that brought this upon themselves. They must reap what they have sown.
Well, that will be the final blow to the Republican party. Paul Ryan and his fellow ideologues have been aiming at the New Deal Programs for a long time. Unfortunately for him and his cronies, there are many more people that rely on these programs than rich people who don't. And we vote and we have the numbers and besides all this silly tax plan won't work. The Republicans will be lucky to make it past 2020. Once again, they have proven they are as incapable of governing as the Democrats. I keep waiting for the day when I no longer have to look at or hear from Hillary. I am hoping for the same for Mitch, Paul and the rest of the boys.
I am very worried about my niece, brother-in-law, and a friend who have MS and are on SSDI and Medicare. I'm not sure what will happen with Medicare - will hospitals and more doctors refuse to treat patients who have Medicare? My husband is on Medicare and their are services our family doctor won't perform because the pay is so low. There are doctors in our area who will not see new patients who have Medicare. Will Americans ever demand that the trillions of dollars "borrowed" from social security be paid back?
1
Mostly Republican talking points in this poorly written article, and NO MENTION methods which COULD be used to ACTUALLY strengthen social security and medicare - only mention of CUTTING them (and that is NOT "SAVING" them). AND it calls them "entitlements" and equates social security & medicare with welfare (as Trump does).
NO mention of lifting or removing the cap, or raising the tax rate (YEP that's right) - OR increasing WAGES, all of which could help with the shortfall expected in 2037 -- all that is mentioned is CUTS (cuts to benefits and raising the retirement age). CUTS are not the only way to deal w/ the shortfall. They ARE a way to pay for the gargantuan permanent tax cuts Republicans just passed for their billionaire owners though, so let's be honest about that at least.
Two major points. First, as long as there is a limit on the maximum monthly benefit, there needs to be a cap on the income that is subject to withholding. Otherwise it goes from old age insurance to a true welfare program. Second, in the 1980's, the contribution rate was increased to bring solvency to SS and yet, here we are again.
1
They will use Luntz techniques of calling "cutting popular benefits for the elderly and working poor just after cutting taxes for profitable corporations" something else: actually SAVING Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Children's Health Program by gutting them. It is the same old same old technique of grabbing goodies and telling the vulnerable to just go away and die because they are not big hitters like You-know-who.
And that's too bad, because genuine entitlement reform (or as Congress will name it, "welfare" reform) is necessary, but it should not be on the backs of those who through no fault of their own--layoffs, delinquent spouses, emptying of retirement accounts by greedy bankers who essentially got away with doing so--are dependent on help from government programs.
In this climate Democrats need to run as real populists who understand what it is to wake up tired from doing two or three jobs, put on work clothes, gulp a little coffee to keep going, and go through the endless day again and again to put bread on the table and educate the little ones while the relatively idle rich, who already have most of the wealth, grab just a little more at the expense of the working and elderly poor.
Have these people in Congress and the White House no shame?
3
All that money flowing in from their wealthy donors must make republicans especially bold in pursuing those donors' interests. The thing is, those donors are tiny in number and republicans can only win by convincing many in the middle/working classes that they have their best interests at heart. Once that trust is broken though, it will by game over for republicans. It's so frustrating that many democrats don't seem to understand this - even doing their best to insult and drive away the very people they should be figuring out how to reach and persuade.
1
I paid into the Social Security Trust Fund through payroll taxes. I was promised the "Entitlement" because I am entitled and I expect the promised stipend in retirement. If the Republicans try to cut benefits in any way, It''ll be open strategic warfare in the Courts. It's time for the national organizations that represent Seniors to begin assembling armies of lawyers with consulting Law Professors to fight the Republicans. If we truly are "A Land Of Laws", that's how we should proceed. There is no excuse for the public to allow just a few hundred Congresspeople to deny them that which is lawfully theirs. Social Security is not an outright gift from the Government. It is a program financed by many millions of Americans. We are entitled because we paid for it.
1
This is just the beginning of the removal of many Republicans from Congress.
Like a seesaw the balance will shift in time-it always does. With Trumps' total lack of popularity and his continuous public lies-he will become the fuse that sets off a big shift. If the budget is to be balance it will take a strong Congress, President and the American public to make it happen. To do it quickly and with certainty we need to increase taxes and reduce spending at the same time. It is simple math not the hopeful fraud that was perpetrated by the current Administration. If we want a better Congress that can compromise on issues we need term limits and limits on the amount of money a candidate can spend for an election. We also need to limit the time a person can campaign.
The haves are going to attempt to slice and dice the programs of the have nots if they go after the entitlement programs medicare, and social security among others. Anything is possible if the grounds for change are moderated. However, as you can see with this latest tax bill, there is no moderation, no middle ground, just take. That approach is uncompromising. That will probably be unacceptable to the have nots.
1
Young people starting out today can forget about working a 40-hour and mother taking time out to raise their children at home. It will take two parents each working non-stop more than 40-hour weeks to get into the financial safety zone and earn enough to save enough for a secure retirement. Those who don't work those extra hours will not be able to retire at all or will end their lives in poverty. The new reality is less leisure time and less time with family. How is this progress? How is it better than the lives our grandparents and great-grandparents lived?
2
GOP leadership is not only having the private sector pay for breaks for smaller-corporations and business, they are having us pay for huge refunds that some of the largest of corporations will get when they deduct their sustained loopholes that smaller-corporations do not qualify for.
Not only is the GOP ‘pre-planning’ to exempt some of the largest of corporations from paying ‘any’ taxes, they are consciously-soliciting more taxes from the private sector ‘in order’ to give hundreds of millions from our Federal Revenue fund to some large corporations in refund. There ought to be something illegal about that. I am hoping that our leaders, lawyers and law enforcement can use precedence in the law and government protocol to keep the GOP leadership from doing this to the private sector.
What are the original rules and regulations on taxing corporations that were created in the 1920's?
If you paid attention, look at the automatic cuts that will result from mandatory sequestration in the 2019 budget thanks to the manner in which this tax bill was passed by the senate and house. Those heartland red state Trump voters are really going to be surprised when the cuts start hitting home.
2
Gotta appreciate the timing of that though - they were smart enough to make sure it wouldn’t hit until after the midterms.
Fox news and Limbaugh will assure the people in the middle of the country and the deep south never understands where the pain is coming from or will re-direct it to the Democrats who didn't stop them.
"May" is a form of politeness. It does not apply here.
2
Republi-Cons.
12
Would someone please give us a date to peacefully assemble and protest in DC? Thank you.
72
How about tomorrow, next weekend, the following weekend, you pick, I am in!
Quote from Ben Franklin:
At the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, Franklin was queried as he left Independence Hall on the final day of deliberation. In the notes of Dr. James McHenry, one of Maryland’s delegates to the Convention, a lady asked Dr. Franklin “Well Doctor what have we got, a republic or a monarchy.” Franklin replied, “A republic . . . if you can keep it.”
The following is the reason James Madison and John Adams were against a (pure) democratic gov't. and in favor or our representative republic:
"Those subjected to abuse can be anyone outside the majority coalition, and their minority status can be based on race, religion, wealth, political affiliation, or even which city or state they reside in. Demagogic leaders become adept at appealing to the emotions of jealousy, avarice, and entitlement. They also denigrate opponents in order to justify prejudicial actions taken by the majority. Soon, oppression of minority classes causes enough conflicts to collapse the democratic process." (Look, sound familiar?)
Have we kept the representative republic?
why don't you set the date? sorry to sound aggressive, but this is why people aren't in the streets. you need to do it. we all need to do it. don't wait for someone to "set a date."
How about January 1, 2018!
Just sayin'. About 25 years ago, Hillary Clinton warned us that "there is a vast right wing conspiracy." She was spot on, but who knew the extent of it?
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Lots of people, just very few in the corporate media who would admit it.
1
And she was correct, except she didn't go far enough. She should have warned us that they are set to dismantle 80 years of progress. The architects of this horrid economic policy deserve nothing less than tar and feathering!
1
Just guessing when most people hear Trump talk about welfare reform, they aren't thinking about Social Security and Medicare, which they have paid into their whole lives.
Unless Millennials start voting in larger numbers, they will be funding benefits for older generations they will not receive themselves... womp womp.
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Most Millennials seem to view older people as some sort of foreign species that resembles nothing they will ever be. They are convinced that elders, no matter their age, from 60 year olds to 90 year olds, are all "Boomers", and they hate Boomers, convinced as they are that Boomers destroyed the country and are responsible for all that ails it. So I wouldn't hold my breath that the Millennials will vote for anything that helps older people.
1
Yes, please cut these programs to the bone, and do it ASAP, including current retirees. I'm outraged at the Boomer generation. How could you let these irresponsible tax cuts happen, AGAIN? Absolutely squandered the budget surplus in 2001. Now this. My kids and I will be paying for your legacies for the next 50 years. No more. It'll be up to Gen X and the Millennials to fix these mess. Just step aside already.
32
Huh? Why is this the fault of the Boomers, blamed yet again. Last I checked Gen X and Millennials can vote as well as the generation older than the Boomers. The endless blame game on "Boomers" gets old.
2
Dennis: In the 2016 presidential election less than half of voters under the age of 30 voted. More than 60% percent of those over 30 voted. The lowest turnout among Millennials occurred in the key battleground states that went to Trump. Maybe you should save a bit of your outrage for members of your own generation who, if they really want to "fix this mess," might stop posting selfies on social media long enough to actually do something that might prevent it, like vote.
6
I am a Boomer and I most certainly did not vote for any of these tax cuts. I did my part to prevent this by voting for responsible people but unfortunately many young voters did not bother to cast their votes. If they had we would not have the disastrous Trump administration that is robbing future generations to give tax cuts to billionaires and is not even using any of this money to repair our crumbling infrastructure as promised. If Gen Xers and Millennials are going to “fix this mess” they’re going to have to actually participate in our system of self-governance.
3
Much like the sleight of hand that went into the tax bill, penalizing blue states by eliminating state and local deductions, republicans will not so much cut entitlements as find ingenious ways to shift blue state entitlement dollars into pay-offs for red states. In effect, cuts are relative to where one lives. I highly doubt that red state politicians will endanger their hold on power by cutting funds to their voter base, particularly in those red states that operate with low wattage economies. This is, as usual, another instance of robbing blue to pay red.
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Actually, I think they'll rob every state they can in every way they can. If you see what they've done to Kansas and Oklahoma, among others, you'll get over the idea that they have any care for the welfare of the people there.
2
It is astounding and most disconcerting that at This stage no one as yet mentions what you have. Red state pols think red state people who are poor, working class, and struggling m.c. will take it...Then again the poor usually do.
I've noticed no one speaks about the poor Alabamas to which the North sends some of its tax dollars to.
States do have ways to resist these things.
Cutting entitlements and social programs is the obvious next step after this welfare bill for the wealthy and corporations. The GOP has been waiting for this opportunity for years.
83
If the GOP really wanted "welfare" reform, they'd cut the corporate welfare the American Public has been forced to subsidize for the past 50 years, while working Americans' own gov't services that allow them to survive, are being decimated to pay for the corporate welfare. And with this latest tax scam, it's happened again.
1
What opportunity is the bottom 60 - to - 80 percent waiting for in the next month or two?
“[The Republicans] think they can get away with it ... I think it’s wrong to count out the idea that the public will figure it out.” I have my doubts about the public figuring it out. The Republicans have "gotten away" with gerrymandering, voter suppression, denying President Obama's SCOTUS nominee even a hearing, electing Mr. Trump, etc. They are masters in the use of fear and disinformation to sway a large part of the voters.
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They are no better than the lying totalitarian regimes than ran over Eastern Europe and kept it oppressed for decades.
The Republicans seem to have forgotten that the money coming into the US coffers is taxes paid by the every day people who work in the US and that money is supposed to be there to pay for services like healthcare, an aged pension, infrastructure upkeep etc. That's what taxes are for. How dare they make it sound like old people, disabled people and people who run into health problems not of their own making are bludgers for needing help to look after them. That's the whole purpose of taxes. Good Lord, how a society treats their aged, disabled and health challenged people says everything about that society and it appears the Republican world is a horror.
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So true. And we need to stop using the terminology of 'entitlements' for programs that support the well being of the public. We must be careful in our languaging which has connotations that can lead to faulty judgement and negative association. Challenge the propaganda . The ones who are entitled are the very wealthy and corporations, who seem to have no end to their greed with policies benefiting so few at the expense of the many and the expense of our planet. There is no regard for the majority of Americans and less ethical morality in these so called 'reforms'. Call this out as regressive and oppressive payoffs to support the power structure, put more in the pockets of an elite, and not at all fiscally responsible. Rape of the working class. To those so called Christians, what would Jesus say? There is no mercy, no compassion, no tolerance, no love in the actions of these legislators and Trump administration.
They did not forget. They do not care.
1
There's a term for it: Starve the Beast.
12
The first republican president famously called it 'Government of the People, by the People and for the People.'
If there's a 'beast' it's the enormous control over our government the wealthy and multinationals have acquired since Reagan. Republicans are fattening that beast. They are starving us.
Grover Norquist: "I don't want to kill Medicare. I just want to shrink it down small enough to rinse it down the bathtub drain:. I think it's been 25 years ago he said. And he's been working at it ever since.
1
IRS fraud....$60 B per year....Medicare fraud $65 B per year. Meanwhile we have the service chiefs clamoring to be allowed to close underutilized military bases (eg., one report says 23% of the USAF's bases are underutilized)....only to be met by Congress' members resistance to closures based on impact on jobs...I live on a base...I see the waste/productivity issues every day. Decades of kicking the can down the road on many major issues have gotten us here.
Dear right wing members of Congress and the Senate,
If you think that you can pay for this tax cut for the rich by eliminating or reducing the public’s rights to social security programs, you better rethink. You don’t have enough money to pay to avoid the awful and terrible swift sword that would be the consequence.
It might not be us, but our sons and daughters and theirs will do in you and yours.
Sic semper tyrannis
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2018 & 2020 = THE GOP IS GOING DOWN!
No amount of Gerrymandering will be able to stop it! The GOP's "win" is a "loss".
If they try taking my benefits, you better believe it will be us that rises up!
"Federal government" now seems synonymous with organized crime.
115
Wrong. Most federal employees are not criminals.
1
Former Republican,
You miss the point. My comment is not condemnation of federal employees. It describes the Trump/McConnell/Ryan administration. But, I think you know that.
Organized Money is more like it.
No, the public will not “figure it out” and rise up to reverse the tide. The bad guys have won- the New Deal and Great Society are headed for the scrap heap. Congratulations to all those Trump voters from the lower middle class who were promised that Social Security would be left alone and were willing to believe the lie. You threw your security and indeed your country away. You deserve no pity.
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Hillary is also responsible for this mounting catastrophe. She let Trump in. She wanted to be President so bad that she cheated and did whatever she could to grab the Democratic nomination even though she was not popular enough to be a winning candidate. A two time loser.
Hear..hear....those who voted for Trump can bow their heads in shame, the mess we will now witness will effect 99% of Americans.......this Tax Bill will cause chaos,death and financial hardship. We need an overwhelming show of people power to ensure that this Tax Bill is short lived and that the GOP suffers for a long time......get out and be active and encourage everyone to vote at every opportunity.
Thanks for that wonderfully uplifting and uniting message! It will heal our supposed differences, don't you think?
If the Republican fiscal and social policy would be made into a movie it would be called, "Feed the Pig".
30
I notice the republicans are staying clear of the abortion issue . That contentious matter is never discussed by them even now that they control just about every branch of government . They know that if Roe v Wade is overturned many of their evangelical and religious voters will stay home or maybe even vote against them , ensuring that many would be sent out of office . What a bunch of hypocrites !!
14
Not exactly. I believe this bill includes a declaration about life beginning at conception. They have their eyes on every ball, believe me.
Oh, perhaps you missed it. They actually put into the tax cut, an bill that was to set up a "deduction to create individual savings accounts for fetuses". In the wee hours yesterday a.m., they were told it wasn't legal to do so. Unbelievable.
Perry, the Republicans are not "staying away from the abortion issue." If only they would. Their tax bill's inclusion of rights to a 529 college funding plan "in the womb" sneaks zygote personhood into law. Like the rest of this noxious bill, this provision shoves an extreme right-wing wish list through.
Western Europe: please invade the United States.
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I would have no problem with Angela Merkel replacing Vladimir Putin as President of the United States.
Better yet, Scandinavia--
BRAVO!! Or deport those of us--who think--and would never vote for these heartless cretins.....to a Western European country that has Universal Healthcare; doesn't have an Endless War Budget, and believes in investing in the citizens of their country.
For comparison, the state and local taxes in CA and NY are high compared to TX:
New York 12.7%
California 11.0%
Texas 7.6%
Now that SALT is capped at $10K, you think CA and NY denizens will finance sanctuary cities out of their pockets?
Politics is local and personal -- watch how quickly they flip their support for sanctuary cities.
11
Texas of course is a Taker state unlike New York and California who pay more in federal taxes than they get in federal revenue . New York and California also have higher Median wages.
3
Nearly American who isn’t wealthy is going to be adversely affected by this in some way or other, including impending, drastic cuts to Social Security and Medicare, and all you can do istake another tiresome, xenophobic jab at sanctuary cities?
Honest to god, I see how Republican politicians get away with their malfeasance. They know exactly how to exploit their base, and the base never fails to deliver.
3
Texas has the 3rd most regressive state tax system in the nation; composed of high sales and property taxes, along with fees.
http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/29392/texas-third-regressive-tax-...
2
An informed electorate is a menace to the GOP so cut education offer religion instead so when they dismantle social security and medicare the GOP can offer their thoughts and prayers to homeless ,starving children and elderly. The Waltons and Kochs etc need those extra billions to maintain private jets and mansions. Let them eat cake was the cry before the last revolution. Hence the need for a strongman are you there Trump.
33
Here's an idea. Cut our bloated military budget and raise the Social Security cap. Individuals making over one million should pay a bonus, Social Security millionaires tax. I have no problem with the corporate tax at 25% as long as all loopholes, and I mean all, are closed. And any funds off-shored (individual or corporate) should be penalized harshly, something that should be coordinated worldwide so scoffers like Apple and the like are have no place to hide. Problem solved. Leave our Medicare and Social Security alone. You Republicans have destroyed the country. Isn't that enough.
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But they gave Susan Collins a letter saying they wouldn't. Can they have lied?
40
The minute that bill passed, Medicare was cut 25 billion this year and $400 billion in the next 10 years. So yea, they lied.
She's not to be trusted. And I from Maine...
From FDR in 1944:
We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.
Among these are:
The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
The right of every family to a decent home;
The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
The right to a good education.
All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
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The Greatest Generation could arguably be said to deserve the largesse that FDR spoke if, but few of them remain. They saved the world from a madman. What have we Boomers and subsequent generations done to earn those perks? The post war era was an aberration in human history. We should simply be grateful that it lasted as long as it did. In a hyper competitive, mature free market, a middle class is elusive. Competition creates winners and losers and for each Bill Gates, there will be millions of homeless. For each Jeff Bezos, there will be tens of millions unemployed. Those are the facts of the belief system that is the secular religion called capitalism. Like religion, you can't turn your back on it just because it hasn't gone your way.
1
Thanks for posting this.
And since Trump and his henchmen are eager to drag us into a war, military spending will go way up. They'll say "the money has to come from somewhere."
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If someone can't shut Trump up and stop with the twittering, that may be a nuclear war - and then $ won't save the Reps 'or' us.
You can have my SS only when you pay back to me every penny I paid in, with interest....following the stock market.
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Tampering with Social Security and Medicare, Mr. Ryan? Expect a public reaction as if you were taking children away from their parents. Do you really want to start a revolution, sir, on the very heels of your plutocratic tax thievery?
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And he went to college on Social Security survivor's insurance because his mom was widowed when he was a teen. She's still collecting it.
I guess it's, "I got mine, too bad for you".
1
Narcotics of TV, Fox-Limbaugh-Hannity news, elimination of basics civics classes from high schools, an infinity of cheap sports and entertainment bread-and-circuses will combine to prevent forever any revolution - or even talk or notion of same - amongst our couch-potato fellow Mercuns.
"Dumb & Dumber" wasn't just a movie; it's a documentable trend across USA over past forty years, perhaps irreversible.
I don't think half of those who voted for Trump have their full faculties or they are fully brainwashed by right wing propaganda "new." Why would they vote for their own economic demise? The press needs to educate them or the propagandists will continue lying to them. How do we get factual news to the red states? Can we sue the parties stopping it and green lighting propaganda news? Do we need an underground press? How has this country gotten so stupid so quickly? Why didn't Obama do something about it while he had the chance? This country is in major crisis and a third of the population cannot see it.
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He did not win more votes - he won because of the Electoral College. Banish it - and Citizens United which says that corps are 'people'. Real people pay their taxes; corps don't.
Maybe they understand that things that might benefit them individually are not, on the whole, good for the country. Stronger labor laws and a higher minimum wage would benefit me and many others but if we had them, the Dow most certainly would not be over 24,000.
1
It hasn't been quickly. They set up right wing think tanks to get Reagan elected and they've been at it ever since.
The Democrats will probably have to go to the streets in protest.
American will have the same safety net as Russians. The Republicans are counting on the suicide rate to go up to level that matches the former USSR or presently Putin's Russia. Highest in the world!
That is what corruption and kleptocracies create, You do not need gas chambers to move death along.
31
That's a great photo of Ryan for reference when I tell you he looks remarkably like a grown up "Eddie Munster", the young child in the Television comedy "The Munsters". Anybody who saw the show will agree with me, he's the closest thing to a "Munster" in Congress as he puts forth policy that will literally kill Americans.
37
vampire looks
Early this morning I tweeted the following:
GOP 2017: give tremendous tax cuts benefiting wealthy
GOP 2019: sorry, we just can’t afford to continue these programs (Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security)
I didn’t realize my fears would come to pass in hours instead of years.
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It is instructive to read the Declaration of Independence, especially this: "That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
The government of the US has been bought. It no longer represents the people. If this is what we can expect to continue it is high time to kick the money-lenders out of the temple by whatever means necessary.
67
This is what happens when the political leaders are isolated for security reasons in an echo chamber. They are out of touch with America and paid off by those who can afford well paid lobbyists. To Republicans, if you haven't got a name brand, you won't see or talk to them. The best example is how Republican Congresspeople avoided the public during break back home when the Health care debate was raging. We no longer have a Government of the people, but a Government of the Government People.
16
The GOP has achieved a long-sought dream: engineer a fiscal crisis so that there will be no money left in the Public Purse. Then, return to a foreign policy that pushes Guns over Butter. With a devastated fiscal base (stripped of tax support), there will be no money for what is left of the Social Contract. We will soon be offered the devil's bargain: shift the economy toward advanced militarization by gutting Social Security, Public Education, and any tax-based support for health coverage. This is the "Third World" that the GOP envisions as the return of the Good Society. What is needed is a radical awakening of the Electorate sufficient to purge the ethical emptiness and greed-based rot from the body politic. On to 2018!!!
44
I don't understand what legislative mechanism Republicans would use to cut Social Security and Medicare without Democratic votes. Do the intend to eliminate the filibuster entirely? Does anybody have any idea? One thing seems clear is that nothing would unite the Democratic Party more than an attempt to do this.
16
The can use the budget reconciliation process (requires only a simple majority) they just used to pass this tax bill for mandatory spending cuts, including Medicare and Medicaid but not social security. That's entitlement reform and they'll need 60 votes so they can't pass it without some Dem support, unless there was a loss of more Dem seats in the Senate and the Republicans would gain 8 more seats to give them the 60 votes they'd need.
I know this sounds like a booked record .... this is exactly what happened in Kansas.
Reduce rates, force cuts in spending. The only ones happy were the rich. Fortunately, after several several years of cuts to social services, education and other services, the voters revolted.
History tends to repeat itself.
37
Lets hope the People come out in full force and vote for people who will protect all the people of the USA! Patric that we have such a low voter turn out!
7
Read:
What's the Matter with Kansas? by Thomas Frank.
This tax cut has been compared to what happened in Kansas.
But Frank's book was written before Brownback and Co. destroyed Kansas. It's about that the Republican majority inevitably votes for the social cultural issues and against their economic well-being.
Religion and politics do make strange bed partners.
So then why did Kansans support Trump?
And legitimate newspapers and real news media should be giving Bernie Sanders and the like much more coverage and ability to speak to the people. Maybe we need some psychiatrists who understand how brainwashing and cults work to help those in far right wing states get a picture of the facts and real motivation behind what the GOP are pushing.
23
A serious effort to reduce wasteful spending is long overdue. Why should the wealthy need to garner the entitlements on the backs of the poor (e.g. Medicare and Social Security). Lots of people think they earned this money, but it is really being financed by future generations. The waste in the military, which spends more than any other country (as a percentage of GDP) is ridiculous. It is high time to cut this waste. If the Republicans want to cut spending, then go for it. But, the people who rely on government as their sole source of help should be immune from these cuts.
5
Polls prior to the Democratic National Convention last summer suggested Bernie was a stronger candidate against Trump than was Clinton. Trump won over the weaker candidate by a technicality, so one could reasonably infer that Bernie could have won both the EC and popular vote, and would have been elected with an actual mandate. No sentient life form could mistake Bernie for a trickle-down supporter. I think this indicates the Republicans have miscalculated and have handed the Dems a drum which they need to beat every day through the midterms and beyond. The rich place their orders and Republican politicians cynically serve them up under cover of faith-based claims of stimulating the economy, but which serve to weaken social bonds and make us ignorant, unhealthy, and distracted.
12
It's already been documented that Republicans were pretending to be Bernie supporters to pollsters to boost the anti-Hillary narrative.
The ONLY reason why Hillary only won by 2% is because there was an 18 month long criminal "investigation". That's all you need to know.
An 18 month long investigation sinks 99.9% of political campaigns and yet she still got 3 million more votes.
Of course the 538 elites known as the Electoral College ignored the will of the people, but that's a story for another time.
Bernie's got his own headaches,.
I'm conservative adn continue to support Trump and I agree 100% Bernie had a very good chance but Hillary and the democrats stole it from him and the voters.
1
Everyone should relearn the following passage from our history:
"No Taxation Without Representation."
Then after you relearn this tidy little phrase that is applicable to anyone that will be taxed twice on their income, follow up by starting petitions in each "blue" state that will be subsidizing these tax cuts to secede from the current state of the United States.
Perhaps if they do not have OUR money, then can finally learn to stand on their own hypocritical two feet, as opposed to picking our pockets in order to pay for their latest pipe dream.
It is time to go our separate ways.
28
Amen. Been waiting for the USA to break up for years; there is no reconciliation here. It's us and them. I want to live in a progressive democratic socially responsible country. The dumpsters can have their dystopia on a platter.
I’d join in the protest, but I am busy working my third job to keep bullied and victimized billionaires afloat. Apparently, they don’t have enough of their own money, the poor things.
41
Republicans get control of govt within first year passed massive tax cut for rich and powerful. Dems got control of govt within first year passed health care for the poor and lower middle class most of whom did’t even bother to vote in last election.
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I paid money out of every pay check for 50 years for Social Security and Medicare. You bet your behind I am entitled to at least get my money back.
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Don't forget your employer paid money in on your behalf also. Social security is not part of the national debt. It currently has 2.6 trillion in assets. This is the big lie they are spreading. They think they can steal our money we paid in for future benefits. We can stop this assault if people would just vote.
Let me remind all of you, USA is a democracy, one man one vote, and the American people have spoken loud and clear thru President Trump and the GOP Congress.
What is happening now and what is yet to come is the will of the majority of Americans who care enough to vote.
Vox populi, vox dei.
Unless you concede the point that USA is not a democracy.
2
Uhhh...didn't you notice the vote count gave Clinton a 3 million one-man-one-vote edge? Just sayin'
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It is not a democracy. It is a republic, wherein lies the problem. The Roman Senate became corrupt. Too bad the founding fathers didn't read more Seneca.
And sadly, it's also not one man one vote because of the Electoral College debacle. Californians only get about 1/3 of an electoral vote compared to Wyoming voters.
2
Haven't you figured out yet that's not how it works. Liberal democrats need to learn the constitution. Besides the fact the United States is a republic. You can twist things to make a point. Trump won 2/3 of states, he won the majority of votes if you exclude CA. See where I'm going he won the Presidency.
Perhaps the Repubs should ask the other half of their 'special relationship' (the UK) how following an austerity program has worked out for that nation. Of course, we know it's not really about fixing the deficit or growing the country - cream rises to the top and that's all they care about. Bleed the country and kick the corpse when you're done is their MO.
And still his base will say thank you sir, may I have another?
13
Your Attention Please Citizens of the USA : Get information , form an opinion and vote . It's up to us !. No need to become an economist or sociologist , the old axiom "if it sounds too good to be true stay away " applies .
Take a stand !
19
VOTE never ever for ANY republican they all lie and steal from the average hard working american. it;'s what thewy know best
19
SS retirement benefit should be left alone. But each SS disability recipient must be reviewed for potential fraud.
Cut Medicare and Medicaid .. bigly cuts.
3
If you're worried about fraud, read the Panama Papers.
Democrats need to take the next, necessary step to safeguard the rights of American citizens. Starting next week, Democrats must vote 100% to shut the government down by not allowing any government financing for anything until the Tax act is repealed. Shut it all down, including the military. Shut it down around the Trump's ears. No more stop-gaps. No more pretense that the Republicans care about citizens, economics, bi-partisanship, minorities, rule of law. They don't. Shut it down. Shut it all down.
33
the gop needs dem votes
no votes the gop is running the govt they get blamed
I agree shut it all down., NOW
18
Do you not remember the Dems are outnumbered?
Personally I don’t care if they end up cutting programs to make up for a $1.5T budget deficit over the next 10 years. I’m comfortable and I’ve got a substantial nest egg for retirement. To the progressive liberals who didn’t think Hillary was good enough to vote for, here’s your just desserts. To the working class who voted for Trump thinking he’d help your kind of folks, I hope you stay healthy, don’t get a disease, and saved enough to take care of yourself in old age.
19
And that is exactly what will bring this country down..."I don't care..." A healthy society cares for all citizens. I hope you live in a gated community and own a lot of guns. You'll need that.
11
Dear Nino: It is amazing how fast your money will go if you get a serious illness, despite your substantial nest egg. If there is no Medicare when you retire...chemotherapy, for instance, is about $15,000 for each treatment. An uncomplicated appendicitis costs about $83,000 just in hospital fees, and that doesn't include the surgeon's fee. You better care if they end up cutting programs!
1
They say that distance lends perspective. From across the Pond, one thing is very clear to me: The Republican Party is America's nasty party.
49
They're America's plutocrat party.
17
Yes, so I have noticed. It is rather obvious to me that the current Republican Party in general, and the Trump administration in particular, have removed any semblance of democracy in your country, once famous for being a meritocracy, in favour of plutocracy. Close examination of Trump's administration reveals this.
1
I blame the Democratic establishment for half of all of these problems by blocking Bernie Sanders in favor of a smug, out of touch candidate.
The rest of the blame goes squarely on the racist Alt, Far, and Conservative Right that voted this obvious disaster of an administration into office.
The time for some gumption from the Democrats is over. They should've matched the bellicose rhetoric and name calling from the moment the 2016 campaigns started. For now, what? Watch the astonishingly rich get richer and the poor get poorer? This is not sustainable and I fear the Republicans have doomed this country to mediocrity while other nations take over. Putin must be in a constant state of laughter right now
20
he's laughing all the way to Trump's bank
10
The Republicans have hated Social Security since FDR and Medicare since LBJ.
They’re riding high now so why shouldn’t both these programs be in their gun sights?
But, you say, the Republicans couldn’t be that despicable!
I answer, have you read their Tax Bill?
41
If this happened in France the whole population would be out in the streets .Come on America ! Go out and protest !
51
You're right. There is something very wrong with us here - we are unable or unwilling to stand up for ourselves.
For Donald Trump to call Social Security and Medicare “welfare” is a dangerous place for him to go.
He promised his own base he wouldn’t cut those programs because “hard-working Americans” paid into those programs all their working lives.
He should consult his dictionary. Welfare is a program freely given to those living below the poverty level.
Social security and Medicare are “pay it forward” programs based on mandatory payroll tax withholding.
Play with that at your peril, Republicans! If you think the backlash over repealing the ACA was bad, you ain’t seen nothing yet. He’ll hath no fury like a retiree who finds the rug pulled out from under him when he can no longer work due to health problems, or the demands of a labor market that won’t hire people over 60.
To tell retirees they have to die while the donor class gets a boatload if middle class money to play with while they live off their dividends could spark another revolution over taxation without representation.
62
'Keep your government hands off my Social Security!'
This is the death knell for the GOP and they will pay dearly in 2018 and 2020.
33
don't count on it.
7
Actually, I believe that they realize they'll probably lose in 2018 and 2020 and Dems will gain control of Congress and the White House. As a result, the GOP will let/force Dems to do the dirty work for them so their hands will be "clean" as they carry the banner of lowering deficits.
Part 2 of the GOP master plan in motion and the ink on Part One still wet.
The poor don't matter and need to hurry up and die off.
16
The moment that Republican begin talking about cutting the safety net (the safety net that Trump voters like) is the moment that they write their ticket out of Washington.
So, please, start talking about it now.
Right now.
Make my day.
32
I think that you may be overestimating the thinking ability of Trump voters...
20
Older Republicans receive social security payments and are in the Medicare program just like the other party. They don't have to be well-informed to notice that their social security checks are smaller and they have to pay more for drugs and hospital care. When Republican millennials' parents have to move in with them because Medicaid paid nursing home payments are cut they will see what they voted for.
1
There's that; there's always that. One just cannot underestimate the lack of thinking ....
Well, yes. That was a huge part of the point.
7
If they cut SS and Medicare, even candidate Hillary would win in a landslide in 2020.
25
I don't get the GOP logic - they know that cutting taxes leads to cutting services, and further cuts to "welfare" ie. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid will hurt their base, directly and significantly. Which will hurt them in the future.
What kind of backend deals has the GOP made with their donors? What specifically makes then so confident that undoing the New Deal is in their best interest? Why would they respond so forcefully and fully to the short-term needs of their donors without thinking about the future? Something seems off.
23
As long as they can get their base to hate people who are not them -- dark-skinned, non-Christians, liberals, immigrants -- their votes are secure. They count on their base finding it preferable to punish people they hate than to take care of their basic needs. When the next recession hits, their talking points will revolve around the economic problems of the white base being caused by all of those lazy, non-working, dark-skinned people, enabled by Democrats, taking their hard-earned tax dollars -- all the while the Republicans pick their pockets. I'm convinced that only economic pressure from outside this country will rein in the Republicans.
It appears that their voters can't or don't do this kind of complex reasoning.
Marshall law? when the revolutionary way II or the civil war II breaks out? squelched by totalitarian plutocracy before we even begin. is that the deal made?
Take heart - there's a solution to this debacle. Since republicans, no matter how nice individually, will march lock-step to move wealth to their donors, for the good of the American people, we must vote them out and keep them out. No republican in a position of power, ever again.
46
Is Mitch McConnell "nice"? How about Paul Ryan?
9
we are one step nearer to Paul Ryan's dream,
or should I say nightmare,of privatizing social security. as a senior citizen, I am horrified at
the prospect of this scenario.
the Democratic party nominated a self entitled,over confident candidate whose campaign managed to lose to the most easily
defeatable nominee in American history.
and now the democrats are reduced to an impotent,blustering bunch shouting vainly
(see the recent tax reform debate) while the
republicans work their nefarious will on senior citizens and the disabled.
we had better hope that the democrats, for all their faults, at least win the house back next November or the republicans will take
apart the great society programs while the
democrats stand at their desks screaming.
23
Can I assume you did not vote for Clinton??? If so, that was like one more vote for Trump.
Don't forget Trump's partner, Vladimer Putin.
At a time when according to top experts most jobs are going to be replaced by artificial intelligence, it seems crazy to destroy the safety net.
Instead we should be seriously thinking about some sort of universal basic income as Elon Musk and others have discussed.
23
And the AI "workers" won't be paying payroll taxes. Another way that social security and medicare will be weakened.
10
If these people actually devastate huge numbers of Americans financially, the reaction will be quite serious.
I think we will have a repeat of the Revolution -- The French Revolution.
31
OFF with their heads
won;'t matter mcuh
nothing insode to make a difference
6
If deficits balloon, the obvious solution is to raise the taxes of those who got reductions and did not spend their money to grow the economy and create jobs. Corporations have welcomed and accepted these reductions but have not promised to use them to create jobs rather than increasing dividends and increasing stock value through stock buybacks. Their propagandists have been claiming this, but corporate leaders themselves have actually not said they would invest in jobs when asked point-blank if they would.
If taxes go back up, corporate and plutocrat money may respond by fleeing the country. Our financial system will be offered fat fees to help it flee; put differenty, our financial system will cooperate in the robbery of our country's wealth as long as it gets a piece of the action. Worldwide financial transparency is the first step in stopping this flight, and without it any attempt to get plutocrats to behave will fail. Worldwide financial transparency would make the existence of current kleptocrats much more difficult; in most countries, people move money offshore because there is no rule of law in their countries (which is often how they got their money in the first place). When how much they stole becomes public, their fortunes will be much less secure. This would be a good thing for the people of the world.
Noone talks about putting taxes back if lowering them raises the deficit. It may not be politically possible, but it is what should happen.
7
"The bill nearing completion isn’t just a tax cut, but a step toward a long-held vision to undo the New Deal and Great Society."
Of course! That was the plan all along. The GOP kept it quiet but what were the Dems doing all this time? They are far better at governing than the Republicans, but their campaigning stinks. The most effective Democratic campaigner all along has been Bernie Sanders, and doesn't even belong to the party. Better late than never, but the Dems had better up their game and quickly, while the Republicans are so obviously cutting their own throats.
17
Many of the posts suggesting "Social Security will be gutted" is more of the same, the Democrat disingenuous and tired message: "Republicans want to push grandma off the cliff". Not true, and this will not happen; and most Democrat politicians know this. Spin, yes both parties spin incessantly.
Being competitive globally, lower corporate income taxes, will cost relatively little and achieve substantial advantage for American employees. The stock market signals a better future, reduced regulatory overkill, and more tightness in an already tight business competition for capable people, people either already skilled or with a positive attitude. Give free markets a chance to produce prosperity for most people, as they usually do.
9
Republicans have tried to pull off this same stunt in Kansas and Oklahoma with the same rationale. This left the states in deep red with no money to pay for public services. So it makes sense that it will create a bigger deficit with the federal budget. Free markets are doing fine at the moment with its current regulations and taxes. If the economy is doing so well, why are they doing this?
22
There why did it not return the so-called windfall you are projecting in previous years?
If at first you do not succeed, fail, fail again?
Oh wait, why let should we let reality intercede with ideology!
4
You're right: they want to kick her out to the curb, not push her off a cliff. But as we learned in Kansas, these tax cuts will pay for themselves, spur investment, and probably tie your shoes for you.
8
Now back off on the hammering of the rich and super rich. One can never have a boat too big, newest private jet, ultra fast and luxurious cars, another bigger mansion, vacations homes, private islands, money stashed in an overseas haven for secret money, etc. And don't worry these "investments" provide jobs for a lot of people, for example, gardeners, chauffeurs, servants, etc. You get the message right.
38
Let's not forget the maids, manicurists and personal trainers.
14
Indeed, for their tax cut consists of steak and shrimp, while masses consists of bread crumbs and water. They will have the nerve to tell the uncouth masses be thankful for what little they gave us.
17
The people have no bread!
Let them eat cake.
Republicans are lying when they state that their tax bill will pay for itself by stimulating the economy. The historical record shows that cutting taxes for large corporations and the wealthy will not stimulate the economy enough to overcome the loss of revenue attendant to their tax cut.
When it suits their purpose, they are indifferent to the effects of their legislation on the federal deficit, nevertheless citing discredited trickle down economics as a smokescreen to placate and delude their easily-misled, gullible base.
For their enjoining master donor class, the endgame is to undermine entitlements and to decrease the taxes needed to finance them. Less healthcare and the consequent early demise of the populace is all part of the game plan.
23
Do you think any of these Republican hypocrites actually believe any of that nonsense?
10
Bernie Sanders, maybe it is time to fire up into campaign mode again, Presidential 2020 mode.
16
Sorry, his wife is in a lot of hot water.
Was he blackmailed to destroy Hillary ? I don't know. But he's way too easy to blackmail to be considered a legit candidate.
VOTE. THEM. OUT. Tell your friends and neighbors to get out and vote. Tell your relatives to get out and vote.
Or Social Security and Medicare will be banished by these GOP clowns. They pander only to the rich and large banks and corporations- the GOP could care less about us real people.
47
Treasons Greetings. Believe me.
90
On the bright side, maybe the sun won’t rise tomorrow.
14
They can't cut Social Security with out 60 votes in the senate.So no ramming through cuts unless democrats help. The 2018 election we have to get out the vote against this tyranny. This is Americas wake up call. We can't sit on the side lines anymore.
40
They don't have to formally "cut" it, just not fund it. As the special Treasury notes that hold SS trust fund $ come up for redemption, the Congress need not include those payments in the budget. It might have a small affect on the government bond market but by only reneging on one narrow class of redemption, it would be slight and temporary. Counting SS withholding as an income asset in federal budgets, it will soon be moving to the liability side as these notes are redeemed to pay benefits. The irony is that Johnson, a Dem, created this issue (unintended consequence) as a means to hide the cost of the Vietnam War.
Since there are evidently no longer any real Republicans in the Senate or Congress, the Libertarian aka Tea Party aka Koch/Mercer et al agenda is now firmly in place. The only way to fix this is to vote them all out. Anyone who does not vote for the Democrat in any upcoming election is undermining our social safety net and our democracy.
39
I personally believe, like you write, the real culprits are not the Conservatives (where are they?) but the Libertarians with their unfettered demand to ' anything goes'. There is the funding, there is the ideology of amassing fortunes, there is the greed.
I despise Libertarians.
24
The fact is, for better or worse, every rule, every regulation, every policy, every program that government puts in place is a limit on your freedom. That is a fundamental contradiction to the ideal that sink or swim, we are each responsible for our own destiny. We may see fit from time to time to engage in activities that require shared effort (and reward) but those must be voluntary. When mutual effort is undertaken by the government, it is by definition mandatory, even coerced. The same rights that allow us to amass a great fortune also allow us to experience catastrophic failure and destitution. Paying into Social Security is perhaps the best example. At its foundation, it is paternalistic. It mandates government control of the individual obligation to support oneself on the basis that some among us cannot be expected to act responsibly.
ad 'Leave Capitalism alone'
Not everybody has the same potential, not everybody starts from the same level.
Beyond that things that need to be addressed on a global scale - like climate, but not only- change will never be on the individual screen.
What you are advertising here is unfettered egoism and recklessness with its' philosophy born in the one dimensional Calvinism. A sure recipe for anarchy and disaster.
So, go ahead, have your own police department, your own hospital, traffic system, ....all existent for only you.
3
Trump, Republicans,The Oligarchy: the only part of government we like is the military. The are the folks who , after all, make us rich by protecting our oil in foreign lands.
The rest of us can die.
If you are not part of the ruling trilogy, your mission, if you chose accept it, is to overthrow them.
18
Why do the bad guys always win in America? It's very discouraging.
44
I am angry at the Republican Congress of soul-less bloodsuckers, who voted to assassinate 99% of our population with this new Tax Bill, last night.
This Christmas, if I could afford it, which I can’t, I would give these Republican Congressmen a replica of the guillotine, a book on The French Revolution, a big box of leeches, a huge lump of coal and the promise that I will do everything I can to utterly destroy each and every one of them politically in 2018 and 2020.
45
The Republicans are the enemy. Time to treat them as such.
103
Republicans become greedier by the day. I can't believe how anyone who has less than a billion dollars could ever vote for them, because all they want to do is steal from us. They are stealing from me, you, the person next to you, your children, your parents, your grandparents, your brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles, and cousins. They are stealing from anyone who works for a living or has ever worked for a living. They are crooks, and we must hold them accountable!
44
If Ryan and Bannon are supposed Christians, they must be reading a different Bible. Did Jesus say give tax cuts to the rich and kill off the poor?
22
to repeat what others say, just to add to the chorus: WELFARE??? You mean I paid my whole life and I'm still working part-time at age 66 and this was WELFARE all along??? To help me because I'm so pitiful, stupid, poor, whatever, that I needed your largesse? What was all that money taken out of my pay my whole life? Gifts for you rich guys? Despite my M.A., my work for public education all my life, to make sure you RICH guys had some kind of literate peons to work your factories, that's all my career was to you? Get some nitwit to ring the cash register for you, but at least they could read- thank god for schooling? You are all too much. I'm gonna die in front of your eyes, right there on the sidewalk, where I will crawl to take my last breath so you can SEE the results of your handiwork. You can step over the body and then get another peon to haul it off. Hope the money buys you an easy conscience.
48
Colleges could raise tuition and cost of attendance to offset the increased tax burden and expected drop in endowment contributions by donors. They could cut financial aid given to the low income students because of the added burden.
This will preferentially(?) impact the low-income students from rural areas and southern states, namely the Trump country. When the consequences are felt wide across the country, the Trump voters will belatedly learn what they have done.
6
I retired in TX at 68 and then we moved to CO. I took a part-time job; my husband did as well at the age of 70. Now we've put our home on the market in order to seriously downsize in an effort to increase our savings
We've both worked and paid into Security since we were in our late teens. CO's current governor, Gov. Hickenlooper is desperately trying to tweak CO's budget to give workers, retirees, and nursing homes and those in hospice care all that he can move from other programs.
Although I've often voted for Republicans during my life, I'm already talking to every neighbor I can about why never to vote for Sen. Gary Cordner, who never shows up for any town hall, at least not without police protection. Same goes for any Republicans in the House on the ballot in 2018.
70
So you did not have savings for old age but did have a house large enough that you could "seriously downsize?" Sound lke your financial problems are you own doing.
4
Have you heard of "appreciation"?
Many people who bought modest homes can sell them for much more if they wait long enough.
6
A house is an investment, Reader in Washington, not that the fact will interfere with your trademark scorn for others.
13
I would like to strip medical coverage from all congresspeople so they have to find adequate health coverage like we do. How could we accomplish that?
Ideas?
50
I agree, Jackie, but many members of this government are so wealthy that paying for private insurance would amount to a rounding error for them.
19
I agree, but would like them to have to 'shop' the market like we do.
6
I marvel at what America has become the land of my birth and one that I served honorably in the Marines in that great debacle Vietnam. Even here in Canada the Conservatives when they campaigned or were the government have never touched our medical services which everyone not only gets but is entitled to. Canadians do not put up with the safety net being destroyed. Guess what they unlike Americans the common Canadian believes that they work and serve the country and the country is all of us together. I don't rich Americans can say that. Yes, if people want to see how drugs began try the Vietnam War when it was a relief from the butchery and was cheap. So, Nixon and the Republicans created the addiction problem and then they have campaigned on the socalled phony War on Drugs ever since. One can see how the new tax cut is going to play out - Oh, we have this massive deficit and debt and Ryan it is the fault of Medicare, and the other social programs. Ryan loves to talk about what a policy genius he is the only book he ever read was by Ann Ryand who by the way collected all her social security benefits. With Ryan and the other Republican ilk and the 1% you see their money is THEIRS and yours is also THEIRS. Americans are nothing more than slaves for the greed of the corrupt. Trickle down has been a failure twice so why would anyone with a brain think three times is different. Great article in the Globe and Mail on the decline of the UK, add the US as well. Jim Trautman
29
How did you make it into Canada? Please tell us - some of us want out of here; most countries are just not going to let us come without millions$$ in our bank accounts as collateral.
Every Republican Congressman in both houses must be met during the holiday recess with the fury and confrontation like what happened when they tried to repeal the ACA only 100 times louder!
We have a run away Congress in control of all three branches of our government and they must be stopped!
26
It's open season on the poor, the ill and the disenfranchised. Call Congress.
31
At the end of the day we need for Propaganda to be labeled as "fact-free" just like our food has to have labels. The lying, lies and more lying has made the worst people the most bold and it is costing us everything.
5
Vote folks. Make sure you are registered, double check your registration. Funny things are happening at election boards these days. Vote in every election, at every level. It is crucial that we clean up the state legislatures before the 2020 census. Time to get rid of the gerrymandered districts. That's how you fight class warfare.
23
A rising tide lifts all luxury yachts.
20
Social Security is NOT an entitlement!
27
Social security is an entitlement, an EARNED entitlement. We are entitled to it because we paid for it through our FICA taxes. There are simple fixes to guarantee its solvency for decades or more - just raise the earned income cap for FICA taxes from the current $113,000 to say $500,000, and because we all now live longer, gradually raise the full retirement age. These tweaks are a matter of calibrating the system. Doing these little tweaks to protect social security is not in anyway the same as "eliminating social security." We have this hoopla about social security because large elements in the country were taught it is some kind of welfare for lazy people, to buy their votes or something. They need to learn some facts for a change!
16
And why should there be any FICA cap? Instead, there should be a balloon in FICA on earnings above, perhaps, $1,000,000.
This is great news. Sorry but it is not the taxypayers' responsibilitiy to provide a living for people. Getting old is not an unforesable condidtion and one must save for it. Having children you can't afford is completely preventable. Also those who are worried about the less fortunate will still be able to help them by contributing to charity. What eliminating welfare, food stamps, housing vouchers will do is to stop the creation of the permanent underclass tht LBJ's "great society" caused. It was a complete failure
8
do you truly believe that minimum wage work allows for saving? That there are enough jobs so that every single person in the country can do this? That everybody has the mental acuity for those jobs?
9
You must be very young.
4
" Sorry but it is not the taxypayers' responsibilitiy to provide a living for people."
Yes, but working Americans have paid into Medicare and Social Security from the first day they worked as FICA contributions, and expect to enjoy that benefit in retirement.
So if your short sighted Republican friends try and take that away , they will be in deep trouble with the American electorate. And all the help from the Kochs and Adelsons won't save the GOP.
7
Let us hope that the average Trump voter gets hid in the head by this with the force of a concrete block.
17
Vote them out - thats what it will take - every single one of them - donate what you can to blue candidates in red states - and make some noise - organize protest - call email fax - get active - we can beat them - but we need all of us to vote - every single one of us - There is a blue wave coming = and we can win more seats in 2018 but what we really need with any Republican president is a VETO-PROOF congress that means a Democrat majority. Swear an oath to do your part no more fighting Democrats get to work.
14
What is wrong with these people? How and why would they think this was a correct thing to do? What kind of ethical foundation do they have, if any? Is it some kind of mental problem or psychiatric? How can they do this? Are they incapable of critical thinking? Do they have no heart? No soul? I don't get it.
27
They call themselves Christians. Don't worry charity will take care you if life gives you a wrong turn. My husband had brain cancer for over a decade, we belonged to the Catholic Church and a Christian Church. Not one of them ever offered any help to us. We will become a nation of go fund mes. Hope you have enough friends that have some extra cash to donate after this tax plan
10
Say hello to the next bubble, when it will pop nobody knows?!?
7
Those who doesn't vote and those who vote with ignorance deserve what they get. Top 1% are very smart and they know how live-off of the bottom 99%. President Trump is very smart person. He knows how to exploit the ignorance and there is plenty of it in the country.
6
They're more greedy than smart.
A smart person doesn't try to suffocate the middle class and the poor, but a greedy person is happy to.
30
And that's honorable and Something to celebrate?
Fairy tales will come true, it can happen to you, if you're Ayn Rand at heart....
17
Paul Ryan would have been flipping hamburgers if not for Social Security which enabled him to have support and education as an "orphaned" minor after his father died. He's got his...you can go whistle for yours.
45
Not so fast.
These incompetent Republicans in the Senate will still fail on tax cuts.
Each of them has become a grandee and is scared off easily.
After 7 plus years of lying to the American people on tax cuts, they manage to vote on a bill with handwritten notes.
Where the heck they and their staff have been.
Total incompetence.
And then, there is always that Senator from Arizona for whom the whole US treasury is not sufficient for the defense and who loves limelight even at his age - will make that Hollywood gesture of thumbs down at midnight.
So, lets not count our chickens yet.
As to deficit, it reminds you of "if you like it, you can keep it" promise - these promises are the lard that keeps our bread together.
I am a Republican. If they pass the tax cuts and the POTUS signs it, then let's have then discussion on spending cuts - but right now way too premature.
World wide right wingers seem to belong to a different species of humanoids from more progressively minded humans. More like Neanderthals but I do not want to insult Neanderthals. Maybe they should replicate the brain scan studies they did on cats v.s. dogs recently and confirm my impression that progressives would have more brain neurons. I find these right wing types in my country very retrograde.
16
While our "glorious leader" is contiually distracting us with trash talk and trash tweets, his henchmen are busy destroying everything this nation has achieved during the last fifty years. Wake up, America! WW III, the rest of the world vs the USA, is on the way.
33
In fiscal year 2015, federal payroll taxes generated $1.07 trillion, which amounts to 6% of the nation's gross domestic product (GDP), or 33% of all federal revenues:
https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-tax/policy-basics-federal-payroll-...
These are not "entitlements" because I've paid into them since I started working when I was 14 years old.
Deficits don't matter, except for the Republicans and their 1% overlords who want them to be paid for by the middle class and the poor in this country, so that Trump, Don jr. Ivanka, Mnuchin and the rest of the obscenely wealthy don't have to pay estate taxes, and can park their monies in the Caymans.
Disgusting.
20
For heaven's sake, just say it out loud...this tax "plan" is evil, even on the face of it. God knows what other wicked things are buried in those 500 pages that none of us can see. It's time for the blind, ignorant or just plain apathetic Trump base itself to wake up, realize that they are being had, and VOTE against the jerks they have in office promoting this plan for the rich. My God, aren't they all rich enough???
20
I've been paying for my Social Security since I was a teenager. It is NOT welfare. I am now 60 years old and I get statements every year saying how much I've contributed.
I want to start a group of people over 60 who march on Washington, to Congress, and nail these Republicans to the wall....
48
Hillary Clinton won the election by three million votes. Yet for the second time in 16 years a second minority president took office who makes the unsuccessful first look like an American Statesman. We now have a draft dodging , women abusing, Nazi endorsing, white supremacist supporting, climate change denying and regulation cancelling occupant of the once respected Oval Office of the American Presidency. And those are his good points. The worst is yet to come until Mr. Mueller completes his investigations. In the meantime everyone who writes on these pages that sees the dangers ahead, must begin to articulate that their comments made on the New York Times on on any of the issues of the day are not differences between "liberal" and "conservative", Republican and "Democrat" but between the Constitution and those that would undermine it or twist its intentions so that instead of providing for the "General Welfare"
would provide for "Corporate Welfare" particularly at a time when the stock markets are soaring as they have sine President Obama took office. Finally, we must post our comments on those sites read by the Trump's base so they can be exposed to those actions of government that have indeed provided for the nation's welfare and their own over several generations.
25
This is garbage.
This is a crime.
Sharon Angle was right.
11
Paul Ryan ...what a hypocrite. His family collected SS when his father passed away in his youth. I wonder how his family would have fared without it. Republicans are soulless, heartless creatures.
88
Paulie rides high on his working out: his P90X and his yoga. Would love to see him hit with a debilitating stroke. There: I said it, and I'm not scared of karma. The man is a monster.
16
I wouldn't wish that fate on anybody.
1
He totally is. Can't stand the swamp creature.
The GOP has high-jacked the language: Social Security and Medicare are not entitlements--we ourselves pay for them. True--some get more than they paid in because they live longer, but some never live long enough to get anything back they paid in for. What the GOP is trying to do is not legally wrong, but it's so breathtakingly morally wrong, that it's hard to know where to begin. The Mercers and the Kochs won't lose money if American citizens get access to healthcare, so I struggle to understand what is the source of this meanness towards the vulnerable.
Those who voted for Trump to make America great, lament the time gone by when things looked like a 1950s sitcom: Newsflash--not only did America not really look like that, but if life was better for many white folks back then, it's because taxes on the rich were high and the government programs put in place by FDR's administration, like the GI bill were helping people get educated and buy homes. This tax bill and the inevitable tearing of the social safety net that the GOP has wanted for decades will indeed make it necessary for the next generation to make America great again.
I hope people vote in the next election--in droves--hopefully to install public servants in office who want to serve their constituents and not their donors.
31
I seem to recall that it was the cry of "taxation without representation" that led to a righteous revolution in this country. The Republicans are replicating those conditions. They are showing that only the rich have representation now. They are more aligned with King George than they are with George Washington. Are they hubristically sitting on a powder keg? Or are they correct in their assumption that the citizenry has lost all sense of what this country stands for?
18
Yes they are correct.
1
Is there any way to limit the cuts to just those people who voted for Trump and the Republicans? They shouldn’t need the help since they all believe the economy is going to take off like a rocket, right? Or maybe we could just limit the cuts to red states like Mississippi and Alabama, where, as we know, years of total Republican political domination have literally eliminated poverty.
19
When Donald Trump was 14 years old, his father Fred, sent him to both Shorehaven and Beechaven apartment building complexes (located on the southern tier of Brooklyn NY) to collect the quarters from the laundry machines. It was then that he learned the lesson that he could get rich by taking away a lot of quarters from people who would not notice that they were being taken from until it was too late. (I lived there and watched this happen)
Now that Phase 1 of the Trump tax plan is in place, it won't be long before Phase 2 gets put in place which is to dramatically reduce social security, Medicare and Medicaid for hard working Americans to assure that the wealthy get their tax breaks.
And, if America does not throw these guys out of office in 2018 we are all condemned to what we've got in the name of white supremecy.
27
Republicans have shown their true faces. We know what comes first for them. However, I have to say that the people who voted for Trump and these cats will be easily reacquainted with the phrase, "You Got Punked". For now, when republicans are chopping up social security and medicare, I will not blink twice. I figure that when they have had enough of LOSING, they will stop voting in these corporate execs.
13
republicans “may” seek cuts?
puhleeezzzzz.
anyone with even a modicum of intelligence knows that they have been chafing at the bit to do that for many, many years.
they have now created their own excuse to do so.
and for those people like me who have been paying IN to social security for their whole life (in my case i have been working for nearly 40 years) — social security is NOT an “entitlement”—it is something i more than EARNED. but—it will be gone, and i will be forced to work until i die, and/or live in near poverty, or full fledged poverty.
i see very very VERY hard times ahead for millions of people.
49
Here we go again, "social security is NOT an entitlement -- it is something I more than EARNED --"
What is it about the word "entitlement" that so upsets people?
You earned it, therefore you are entitled to it, that is what makes it an entitlement.
Would you prefer a term that suggests otherwise?
12
If they begin to tamper with people's personal savings, which is what Social Security is, since we all have been made to pay into it since our very first paycheck, they will ignite a rebellion they won't have any idea what to do with. People whose money has been taken away will have little to lose, and people like Paul Ryan will need to be very afraid.
71
People are living much longer today than when SS started. Also many of the current recipients take out more than they contributed even when adjusted for inflation. So SS needs be fixed.
Welfare, food stamps, and housing vouchers should be eliminated. No need to reward the lazy and irresponsbile. For those very few are truly deserving help there is charity.
2
Sure, those disabled people in their wheelchairs should get out their and hustle. Anyone can get in a car accident you know. Do you Drive?
15
No need to support the lazy and irresponsible? I guess that means we should stop paying Congress effective immediately.
19
Ahhhhh. The DC Barrister strikes again with his oh so compassionate responses
7
"And it was passed along sharply partisan lines, offering nothing to Democrats, and leaving them with no obligation or incentive to negotiate ..."
Sound familiar ? This was the modus operandi for Dems in passing Obamacare. And the idea that had the GOP cut taxes less, then Dems would cooperate in reforming entitlements is farcical. Dems would rather cut off their left leg than cut entitlements. It's their one claim to political power as the party who knows how to take from one person's pocket to give to another.
Republicans know the political dangers. It's very difficult to take benefits away from people after they've received them - even if they haven't paid for them. "According to the Urban Institute an average-earning couple who retired in 2011 would have paid about $116,000 in Medicare taxes over their lifetimes, but can expect lifetime Medicare benefits of $357,000 net of premiums. "
https://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/10/health-care
One of the main reforms the GOP will likely push is simply means testing. As an example, Warren Buffet (worth over $40 bn) does not need government healthcare or pension. This would help ease the pending insolvency of the programs (projected in just 11 years) without needing to raise taxes. Another help would be to allow these programs to fund future liabilities by borrowing at today's low rates - and using the proceeds to invest in the public markets - much like the pension funds for every state in the nation.
4
Excuse me, but go back and look at facts.
For the ACA there were many many talks and there was public input - the GOP had 7 years to offer the alternative for the ACA- they never did it. The tax talks are outright lies with NO input from others.
Medicare is something people paid into themselves. It is NOT an "entitlement" - it is OUR $$$.
26
This is nonsense. The ACA was discussed/negotiated for a year-plus, and included multiple Republican amendments. It was debated on the floor for two weeks. And the idea behind means testing Social Security/Medicare is to take away the fact that these are programs that everyone uses. Once they are marked as programs for the "poor," they they will be on the chopping block faster than you can say Jack Spratt.
25
Those of us in the elderly ranks need to be very afraid of what the GOP plans for Medicare.
Neither of the NC GOP senators cares at all for the low income or older constituents in this state, so we have to expect they will vote in favor of cuts to this bedrock program. As will most GOP senators. While enjoying markedly generous health insurance not available to the rest of us. And with no feelings of shame or guilt about the hurt they will wreak on their own folks at home.
Moreover, our children are facing such horrendous assaults on their financial well-being — higher taxes and cuts to all kinds if other programs — that we, their parents,cannot sensibly expect them to be able to help us out!
The elderly vote! We need to do that in 2018 to throw the GOP out, hopefully in time to save the programs for the elderly. This is quite apart from saving the American democracy!!
14
Is it true that Paul Ryan used social security benefits to pay for his college education?
39
Most definitely. He probably used Social Security money to buy all those Ayn Rand novels that poisoned his mind.
10
The alleged "progressive" Republicans
didn't have the guts to vote against this bill.
Corker was the only one, he has my respect.
How do the others justify their vote?
Is it a payback to their wealthy donors or
Disregard for the struggles of the economically
stressed and the middle class?
29
Corker voted against it because he's retiring. Respect is not realky warranted.
3
The Republicans know that deficit spending is a huge source of private wealth. The next logical step is to make sure that the bonanza doesn't get redistributed away. We're in Civil War 2.0, and the South is winning this time. It feels as if they're applying the vengeful fear-driven post-Reconstruction politics of Alabama or Mississippi to the whole country. Trump gives full expression to their feelings. He has demonstrated that the night riders can now safely remove their hoods.
26
All of these senators and congressmen/women should try living on $1,690 per month and see how they would manage. It is scary what Republicans might do but every American, no matter what age they are, need to be very wary of what they may do to the safety net for seniors, disabled and others who don't have money to waste. I worked 47 years as a secretary so my SS is decent but I have no money to spare each month. Really tired of seeing grinning senators and congressmen who don't know beans about those who are getting by. They are truly out of touch.
91
You cannot save people from themselves. Obama tried that and this is where it got us!
3
Joan, if you live in San Diego, not a smart choice for a retired person with a small income. Many many less expensive places to live. 47 years is a long time to prepare for old age. Why do you have only SS?
3
Reader In Wash, DC: Great! Joan is moving in with you since you seem so concerned about her retirement savings and where she lives!
2
Seems to me we need a third political party, one that represents middle America. I could never again even consider a Republican, but the identity politics of the Democrats make them impossible for me to be enthusiastic about either. How about a third party?
10
"the identity politics of the Democrats make them impossible for me to be enthusiastic about either."
The Democrats welcome everyone, The Republicans distract you by calling it "identity politics" since "everyone" includes a lot of diversity
Here is an example of what the Democrats would do:
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/fixing-americas-infrastructure/
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/health-care/
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/jobs/
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/a-fair-tax-system/
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/an-economy-that-works-for-everyone/
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/campaign-finance-reform/
and many others on that web page at the policy link
Don't let the Republicans distract you. Look at policy proposals and how each side votes.
7
Hillary had good ideas, I’m too unmotivated to click on all your links, but she WAS NOT an effective candidate. Her husband, in his prime, would have had the visceral political moxie to have squashed Trump. Time we moved on. If we click on Hillary Clinton links going forward Mr. T will be reelected.
Reform of Social Security and Medicare to ensure it for future generations is a good idea as long as it entails SHARED SACRIFICE. And the safety net is not shredded for the neediest among us.
I am amazed. The plan all along has been to create a deficit so large that the only hope is to gut entitlements, ie Medicare and SS. Finally, after all those years of trying the Fountainhead of Republican thought can see victory on the horizon. Now you're beginning to wake up and see what you've done. Just a few months ago you didn't see a difference, you didn't feel like voting, you sold your common sense for a pocket full of lies and so, as will be told by future generations, that early in the 21st Century, a once proud Democracy became a tyranny of the minority.
48
America has been unwise to have the highest business marginal tax rates among all nations in the world (combined federal and state income taxes), considerably higher than even social democrat Europe, and even Sweden the social paradise. American Democrats have ignored America's need to be competitive in global commerce. And, we lose a substantial amount of revenue too, because businesses can redirect profits offshore to some extent, in multiple ways because trillions of business transactions are impossible to fully audit among global enterprises.
Why is being competitive worldwide a sin, a scam, a terrible outcome of tax reform. Please explain.
4
No major American Corporation pays the full amount of the taxes- it is usually about 12-14%. Some pay none. The taxpayers even had to pay GE one year. Just like Trump does not pay taxes. Do not be a chump this bill is robbing us.
Social Security and Medicare are not welfare.
We pay all out lives for these benefits.
But, here is the point.
These Radicals are drunk with power and they are going to get crushed by you and me.
What bad people do, good people can undo.
Listen…
In one of the worst periods of our Revolutionary War, with a general feeling of despair as average people struggled with taking on the powerful British military, George Washington crossed the Delaware River and basically punched the British in the face by attacking at Trenton New Jersey.
Word of this "punch" spread and reinvigorated the regulars who were taking on the fearsome British.
It helped spur on the entire effort toward victory.
Now…
Register to vote.
Make sure you follow the requirements.
On November 6, 2018 (next year) punch these radical, insane Republicans and take the House and Senate away from them.
(plan a day off from work if need be)
On November 3, 2020, punch Donald Trump in the face and kick him out of office. His whole administration is a mistake.
No excuses.
Our founders sacrificed MUCH more than us.
They didn't give up.
Don't despair.
Look at George Washington on that dollar bill.
Punch.
39
And do what exactly vote for a democrat? No thanks I'd rather stay home until there is more than two options dem/ rep are no longer appealing.
Many of the current SS and Medicare recipients receive more than they paid in even when adjusted for inflations. So yes they are welfare.
1
@ Reader in DC
Eliminating alternative minimu. tax and estate tax is welfare for the rich. It also formula for replacing representative democracy with plutocracy.
2
Every cent they cut will come out of local economies. Local businesses
will suffer big time. We are headed for another U.S. Economic Collapse.
Such blatant and scandalous dereliction of duty from the "aren't we wonderful"
Republicans.
25
For over 200 years the people in what are now red states have hated the idea of democracy, equality, and education for all, and they have resented being required to follow those values.
They finally got their revenge.
They have dismantled our democratic institutions.
They are instituting and cementing inequality.
They are demolishing the resources for education, infrastructure, healthcare, and the well-being of all Americans.
Time to cut'em loose.
No longer should any monies whatsoever be sent to these states that hate the values that have made this country great. They have made their beds. Now they must lie in them.
They can't be allowed to drag the rest of us down with them.
25
Because we are no longer the democracy that had a semblance of a social contract across all the states, i think this correspondent has a point. No tax monies from states that pay their own way to states that do not and elected the catastrophe of this president and this Congress. Those voters brought on this mess, and i see no reason to continue bailing them out.
4
Quit with blaming everyone in red states - they've been betrayed. And no, I'm not Rep - Dem (and Far Left) all the way.
They were gerrymandered. Definitely not all the people in so-called 'red states' voted for this mess or any Reps.
Because so few in Camada like the USA have employer pension plans especially defined benefit plans the Government of Canada has increased deductions for the Canada Pension Plan. This is a combination of employee and employer contributions. If you are self employed you pay the entire contribution yourself. There is also the Old Age Pension subject to clawback and a Guaranteed Income Supplement for the very low income. Some provinces have other supplements. We have the equivalent to your own contribution plans.
7
Thank you Red State voters, for saddling the rest of us with these morally deficient, dishonest, bottom feeding GOP representatives. After Grandma exhausts her assets to pay for the nursing home, and she looks to Medicaid to cover the cost of her care, and she finds that Medicaid isn't there for her, explain to her that you chose Trump, Ryan and McConnell over her.
120
And Grandma can move in with the relatives and they'll have to figure out how to take care of her when they have no training to do do.
9
Grandmas relatives won't be able to pay her nursing home fees, either, because the Republicans stripped out the Medical Deduction for high Medical expenses, with their Tax Reform bill.
12
Skier 6 - not enough attention has been paid to this - lost of medical deductions.
We'll see how FOX spins it. They will no doubt twist language to assure their viewers that the tax bill will be great for them, too.
14
I love women, but you can't send women into battle and that's what this is. Get some real men to fight the Republicans before you lose yet another election and become totally powerless. Don't get me wrong. I really cheered for Clinton but also learned you need tough men to lead.
6
Yes, even now, in 2017, in this modern age, women are still considered less capable than men. Thank you for underscoring that inescapable line of thinking that has done so much damage.
This isn't a battle done with swords and shields. This is a battle of wills and determination. I'm sure you'd be surprised that women are just as capable as men - and sometimes more so - in getting what they want.
But what do I know? I'm *just* a woman. I'll head back into the kitchen now after I take care of the kids.
/s
Eh? Hilary Clinton is as tough as come. What is Angela Merkel doing all these years - crying her eyes out in the bathroom?
Like Macbeth, they may have wished for and used darkness to mask their dirty deed on wealthcare, but they will have no such cover if they dare kill anything related to Social Security. The gloves will come off and the pitchforks and canes will be marching on Washington, and any smokescreen from Fox, Sinclair and Koch will be seen for what it is by we fierce retirees. Fair is foul and foul is fair indeed.
22
And yet a majority of seniors voted for Trump and vote Republican. Why?
29
Trump lied about every promise he made.
5
Of course! The purpose of the United States Government is now to protect the interests of corporations and extremely wealthy people. That is it. Goodbye representative democracy. Just ask the Speaker of the House who in his twisted mind is at once a Christian and an adherent of Ayn Rand.
20
I feel physically ill about this. Cannot write more now. Will get back to you later.
15
Ironically, the same people who during the Obama years chanted "Hands off my Medicare" and "don't threaten my SS payments" will be the same ones cheering and jeering GOP bills and budgets that gut their Medicare and SS.
23
Dear Sen. McCain,
As you are spending hundreds of thousands of our hard earned tax dollars on your disease, I'll make you a deal. If you sign the final bill gutting the mandatory insurance for the ACA and tax cuts lining the pockets of the rich, then you should put a rider in the bill halting the Cadillac health insurance of the entire Congress. You and your fellow thieves can then see and feel how much of the country lives - and dies!
61
This just shows the hypocrisy of those called CHRISTIANS. The so called prosperity gospel is the religious equivalent of a wall street trader.
Obviously there are good religious people.who practice true charity but your gop types are not among them. Throw the money changers out of the temple.
27
Where were the Democrats? Such a weak opposition. Did they quietly want the tax SHIFT to pass hoping that it would backfire and they could win in 2018 without needing a program?
Thanks Dems for protecting us. Cowards all.
2
What were they supposed to do? This was passed under the base-majority budget reconciliation rule allowing for it to pass with only 50 votes + tiebreaker from president of the Senate - Mike Pence. With the Democrats having only 48 seats, they had no chance to stop this. If you want to get mad, get mad at the states which elected Republican senators. The fault here lies with we - the people - who elect these senators and not with the Democrats in the Senate who - to a person - voted "NO".
20
I guess you haven't noticed that the Democrats are in the minority in both houses of Congress. It's true that there are systems of government that offer vehicles for vigorous opposition on the part of minority parties. I suggest you endeavor to change our system into one of those.
9
"entitlements" = "...unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, ..."
5
Racism (slavery, Jim Crow, etc) in part built this country and now is poised to destroy it. Trump and his enablers in the GOP relied on racism to get elected and secure power, including the false racist claim that Barack Obama was not born here and Mitch McConnell’s racist vow to make Obama a one term president. To the extent this morally obscene tax bill and coming dismantlement of middle class entitlement programs succeed in finally ruining what’s left of the social fabric in this great country, such ruination will have all began with the toleration and perpetuation of racism and quasi-white supremacy that is the currency of the right wing so brutally wielding power today.
37
Is there anything more revolting and inhuman than getting your start in life because of Social Security (how Paul Ryan paid for college after his father died) and then snatching the lifeline from others?
108
This is their best shot?
1
Republican mendacity knows no bounds.
15
Putin and Xi Jinping must be cheering from the sidelines. Members of the Republican Party, aided and abetted by their demented leader, are doing their best to destroy the fabric of American society from within. To paraphrase Mark Twain, they represent a "distinctly native American criminal class".
18
Onward and downward!
10
Cut social services and Social Security yet they will increase military spending by billions. What a farce. Yet the American voter will probably vote these same republicans back into Congress come 2018.. Who's really to blame? The average stupid voter.
95
Along with the more educated and enlightened voter; either for failing to vote according to logic over emotion or for failing to help enlighten and educate those around them - take your pick.
4
And that military spending will not go to personnel or vets, but industrialists who schmooze at Mar-a-Lago.
7
They weren't honestly voted in the first time.
1
Let's face facts, neither party has been a defender of social programs over the past 25 year: Clinton signed the bill that gutted our meager (by European standards) welfare program, Obama siphoned Medicare funding to fund ACA, and Obama offered Social Security cuts twice, joined by Pelosi the second time.
We either have to reform a Democratic party that has lost its way, or begin a third party.
10
In my local newspaper, and to some extent in the NYT, lots of people are celebrating the presumed reduction of their tax bills. They seem bewildered that so many of us aren't popping open the champagne bottles.
What the celebrants haven't considered are: (1) which of their current costs will go up and (2) which of the their current services will go down, as a result of this bill.
The economy can't grow enough to offset these cuts, and they assume falsely that it will be someone else's services, not theirs, that will be cut.
At the risk of sounding like a communist, most of the productivity gains over the last two decades have gone to the richest 0.1% of this country. That's why I have no moral qualms about increased taxation on this group and serious moral misgivings about reducing taxes in a way that primarily benefits this slice of the population. They don't deserve it.
24
When I give a look at the polls in Alabama, the obvious effect of this Tax reform and the government cuts the GOP will then implemented I truly believe that Trump and the GOP would remain in power in the USA NO MATTER WHAT.....the state of the union is weak,very weak!
5
About 50 percent of eligible voters didn’t bother to show-up at the polls in November 2016.
One result is that corporations and the wealthy will make out like bandits.
Our democracy is crumbling without careful tending by an informed and involved citizenry.
33
Consummately evil and shortsighted.
16
2003. Start of Iraq War. My buddy and I were watching the invasion on work lunchroom TVs. "This will be over in a year" he said. I was incredulous. So I proposed a bet. If the war is over in 2 years, I will pay you 500 dollars. However, if it goes on longer than 2 years, he would have to pay me 100 dollars for every year the war lasts. Around the time of the debates in 2016, I called in my bet...a war lasting over 10 years gained me 1700 dollars. Friday night this week, sitting in a bar. TV news on about the tax cut. Man next to me says, this tax cut is just what we need. I reply, the country will be broke and in a recession in 8 years because of it. He says, no way. I take a swig of beer, eat a few bar peanuts, and say...care to make a bet?
139
Trump won the 2016 election with older (age 45 and up) voters. They'll be getting exactly what they voted for.
55
Only the dumb ones. Don't tar all seniors with the "stupid" brush. I'm a senior citizen and I didn't vote for that awful, awful man. I saw this mess coming a mile away.
Trump won the election because:
1. half the voters didn't bother to vote. They deserve what they get.
2. many of the Bernie supporters would not vote for the person who actually won the Democratic primary. They stayed home and sulked, or voted for a marginal third party that had zero chance to win. They deserve what they get.
3. the left-wing purists thought Hillary Clinton wasn't "perfect" enough to suit them. So now there is a loony billionaire in the White House. Is he "perfect" enough for them? They made the "perfect" the enemy of the "good", and they wound up with the "horrific". They deserve what they get.
4. Republican dirty tricks like gerrymandering and voter suppression. In 2016 they crossed the line into treason by collusion with Russian hackers, trolls and Kremlin-backed fake media sites. The Russian hackers upped the ante with actual meddling with voter registration rolls, to knock Democrats off the rolls by changing addresses, etc.
(Next time around they will probably hack and flip actual votes- I have not seen any efforts to prevent this. ) Those in the Trump administration who colluded with Russia to destroy our free elections deserve to be in prison, for treason.
6
You are scorning a lot of good people. What stereotypes might someone use to hurt you?
2
Unfortunately, so will millions of seniors like me who didn't vote for him.
And if you're a millennial, I should mention that in my door-to-door canvassing and get-out-the-vote calls for HRC, I observed a disturbing trend among millennials who were simply not voting the top of the ticket, or were voting for Stein, Johnson or dt himself.
You reap what you sew.
3
Medicare and Medicaid alone will bankrupt America unless we address our broken healthcare system. The new tax cuts are irresponsible and don't help the big picture. If the Republicans think they can change Social Security they are clueless. Today's retirement plan is the 401K. Most people don't or can't save enough to them. Many workers, do not have them available to them in their jobs or they get zero match. If the Republicans had their way, they would have made it harder to save to a 401K. We cannot continue to give the Department of Defense and Intelligence Agencies a continual blank check as our own country rots and decays from within. We are our own worst enemies.
61
I'm upset about so much I don't know where to start!
My husband (retired physician) and I are in decent enough financial shape, for now at least.
I fear for our kids however. One is single and works 2 jobs. The other is married with one kid and both parents work. Neither is sitting around on their rears. Between federal, state, self-employment taxes, and health care costs both are getting hammered financially. And it's going to get worse! Neither spends money frivolously. We help occasionally when necessary.
But what about those who don't have families in a position to help? Please explain to me how the middle class, working population with a decent income, can pay the bills?
And then I'm concerned about the possible but seemingly imminent cuts to Medicare. If either my husband or I get seriously ill, more likely as one ages obviously, and an increasing number of doctors and hospitals refuse Medicare patients, what do we do? Our savings isn't infinite.
And then there are so many others in that same position. And don't even start with those on Medicaid.
The republicans can own this mess. It's theirs. If only those that keep voting them in will realize what it is THEY are responsible for.
98
Very well said. Thank you.
If you note, the only mention of social security is with regard to its future. The commentator is right and legislators are aware that it is not an entitlement but rather a mandatory retirement plan. Even self employed persons are required to pay into it.
It's only mindless hysterics that say that people won't get at least what they put in back.
4
I believe that you are too sanguine. Paul Ryan has talked about means testing receipt of Social Security benefits.
16
So you won't mind if I come stay with you when the rug is pulled out from under me? I've longed to see Niagara Falls anyway.
7
So people confuse two quite different things that are both administered under 'social security'. One is the thing that survivors of people that pay into the system and the disabled get benefits and the other is the retirement or pension plan that was originally created for that purpose. One is in fact an entitlement, the other is a mandatory pension plan.
It's not my fault if dolts conflate these things, their position in society notwithstanding.
The US Falls is a great place to come to, it's far cheaper than about any other world name place.
The Democrats are so inept. They should have been hammering this plan night and day for raising the deficit. Instead, they went on about "raising taxes on the middle class" -- which is true when you get into the technical aspects of the bill long-term. In the short term, most "middle class" Americans will in fact get a tax cut.
The jugular on this was/is the trillion dollar blowup of the deficit. Instead, watch the Democrats mix three or four barely-coherent messages together, all preaching to the Democratic base and none of which will hit the Republicans where it would actually hurt them with their voters.
The Democratic party needs a new cast of characters at the top.
23
I heard several Democrats hammering this plan night and day for raising the deficit and they weren't the only ones. I heard Chris Van Hollen, Democratic Senator from Maryland in the debate last night, broadcast on CSPAN, railing against the damage to the deficit in a speech on the floor. This tax plan has been exclusively the work of the Republicans. Don't start blaming the Democrats. They all voted against it.
48
To be fair, they were basically taken off the air.
Any Democrat who went on TV was forced to talk about Al Franken and Donna Brazile and when they tried to talk taxes "oooh ... sorry but we're out of time".
1
When I was younger, gutting the safety net was the dream of fringe and conspiracy groups like the John Birch Society.
Now they, via the Koch Bros, whose dad was heavily involved in this group, and who actually worked for Stalin finding oil in the fields of Russia, have made our government a vehicle for their ideology. Billionaires who cannot rest until the citizens of America do not have a safety net.
It must be a strange legacy to be so toxic that America would have been a better place without you!
56
Again, this is what the right wing killed Kennedy for;they want to rule like Stalin, starve people, let them die, but no one should disturb their flow of dirty oil to their bank accounts while killing the planet;arrogance and ignorance;all the GOP Congress took Koch money and denied climate change in return;these do not represent us;their bills cannot take effect;they are criminals ALL
5
Of course -- "We don't have any money, the debt is getting worse -- (because we gave all those tax cuts to the rich people); so now, we have no choice but to cut the benefits to the sick, old and poor people!"
The fact that Bush II wasted over a trillion dollar in a multi-year war in Iraq was a huge factor in the GOP's loss of Congress in 1996.
Now, in the middle of the night, with a few scribbles on a piece of toilet paper, the GOP has inflicted more financial damage in a single night than Bush did in 3 years.
43
Of course -- "We don't have any money, the debt is getting worse -- (because we gave all those tax cuts to the rich people); so now, we have no choice but to cut the benefits to the sick, old and poor people!"
The fact that Bush II wasted over a trillion dollar in a multi-year war in Iraq was a huge factor in the GOP's loss of Congress in 2006.
Now, in the middle of the night, with a few scribbles on a piece of toilet paper, the GOP has inflicted more financial damage in a single night than Bush did in 3 years.
6
Cutbacks to Social Security and Medicare are very real threats and have been for some time, as I noted in my book about boomer politics ONE NATION UNDER AARP. (And remember that Barack Obama was willing to consider possible Medicare and Social Security "reforms" in efforts to strike a "Grand Bargain" with Congressional leaders on a major budget overhaul.) But I don't think the corporate/Ryan GOP wing (which piloted the plutocrat tax cut bill) would be stupid enough to make obvious threats to Social Security or medicare in an election year. But if 2018 elections results are not an overwhelming repudiation of rule by the GOP corporate/globalist wing, then look out for the long knives in 2019.
12
Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan are two of the biggest disgraces ever in modern United States government. We are not a democracy. We are an oligarchy. It has become a de facto crime to be poor.
53
The gospel of conservatives has always been "of Those Much is Given, Nothing is Expected"
18
Way to go Voters — next they will do away with social security and medicare and then medicaid leaving thousands on welfare — you voted for these people, so now you all live with the consequences.
23
If Ryan gets his way, there won't be any welfare to fall back on.
"Bootstraps", the perennial war cry of the conservatives. Except, of course, when your dad does you a favor by dying young so you can reap the benefits of survivor's Social Security.
But I'm sure that Ryan would be the first to tell you that's TOTALLY different.
It's similar to the abortion debate. "There's no moral abortion...except MY abortion." Because it's very easy to wax philosophical about devastating life events when they're happening to someone else. When they're happening to YOU, it's an entirely different situation and has to be considered carefully.
The lack of empathy is appalling. And very familiar.
Except there won't be any welfare. Blame those who voted for Reps and Trump, whichever state they're in, the Electoral College, and blame our hacked voting machines (see the blackboxvoting site).
This tax bill is an open declaration of war on America. America will respond.
50
Yeah, they'll respond by reelecting trump. Open your eyes.
7
Sure they will.
They'll vent about it on Facebook, offer thoughts and prayers to families devastated by a job loss or a cancer diagnosis, maybe donate five bucks to the latest GoFundMe, and then go back to watching Dancing With The Stars.
Never underestimate the short political memory of the American public.
Bottom-line, Social Security and Medicare are on the chopping blocks in 2025. In spite of Trump saying he won't touch both, consider them at risk. What to do? Take your social security as soon as you can! If you ain't rich in Trump's America, you are better off dead.
18
Ready for a sickening irony? When Ryan was a teenager, he was a recipient of Social Security survivor benefits upon the premature death of his father. For him and his family, it was an economic lifeline. And now this. Where do these humanity haters slither out from?
136
Thank you for this tidbit. There are other people in Congress who experienced a version of this story -- but some of them haven't forgotten how the safety net saved their families and helped them recover from misfortune. What's wrong with Mr. Ryan that he would deny the same crucial aid to other families?
1
John Grillo: Remember Paul Ryan, during the 2012 general election campaign, said, "There are only two types of people in this country: makers and takers."
I have no idea why the people of his district in Wisconsin continue to vote for him.
That was different. That was *his* family, and *his* trauma, and *his* personal affliction. Therefore, it's important.
But if it happens to someone else?
Best you'll get is "thoughts and prayers". More likely, an indifferent shrug and a desultory comment about "bootstraps".
1
What a wonderful American Christmas. Republican billionaires getting their pay out, Republican Congressmen getting their job done before the Midterm Elections are cancelled and we become a colony of Russia. Democrats cowed hiding in a corner. Putin must have dirt on everybody.
9
Republicans will deflect planned entitlement cuts by reverting t to the same playbook that brought them into power in 2016, attacking Democrats as being weak on crime, guns, religion and illegal immigration.
6
Republicans must be torn out of government root and branch. There are no good Republicans - only less horrible.
They all must go.
27
They cut, we revolt...simple as that.
35
I was patiently waiting for someone to finally say the R word.
2
I didn't realize the money taken from my paychecks for 40 years to fund Social Security was considered WELFARE.
121
Thank you, Karen. We really need to reframe this discussion and remind everyone at Social Security is not some unearned benefit. We have been paying for it our entire working lives.
If North Korea succeeds in nuking the USA, I hope the first strike will vaporize the Capitol while Congress is in session.
Then maybe we can re-build without the swamp and without the vile swamp-creatures that flourish in Washington, DC. The place is an unspeakable cesspool.
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I think cuts to Medicare and Social Security will hit those who have an individual income in excess of $95,000 and couples with a joint income of around $150-175,000. They will pay an even higher amount into Medicare than they presently pay, and will pay a substantially higher payment when they become eligible. Their supplementary policies will not pick up the difference unless they raise their rates substantially.
I fully expect that people with a certain level of income ( it won't just be the .1th of 1%rs affected - it will dip deeply into those who consider themselves upper middle class - even middle class in HCOLAs, will have to pay in but will receive nothing.
None of this will affect those of us already over 65, and may not affect anyone but those under 55 - perhaps even 50. But it's going to happen. It's not just Republicans who will make this happen. Just look at the enormous cutbacks in the NHS in Britain and other European countries. Their very generous plans have become unsustainable.
To fund these generous plans would require a tax rate that is unpalatable to the group that pays the most in taxes - the upper middle class - our most productive group of citizens. Just taxing the super rich won't bring in enough revenue. All that 1% nonsense is just that -in fact, there are very few of these people and they already pay millions a year in taxes. No, we have to go substantially down and it would mean going from a 35% tax bracket to 85%. Undoable.
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Susan Collins said she had a "personal commitment" from Mitch McConnell that Medicare wouldn't be cut because of the tax bill.
We'll see.
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Susan Collins believes in unicorns if she thinks Mitch isn't going to burn her.
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Anybody surprised at the flip flop? Republicans now ignore deficit concerns, while Democrats have suddenly become deficit hawks. It's politics. Agenda trumps character.
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Will Trump’s White rural base, many who receive social security disability payments figure out this means them? Probably not . Cutting welfare means those other people, not them.
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