To appropriate a phrase long used to describe the GOP coalition, it’s the “Three-Legged Stool” of Trump-GOP subterfuge. The three legs of the swindle—let’s call this the “Three-Legged Scam”—are as follows:
1. Deficits pose a civilizational threat to our country and the American experiment, but only when a Democrat is in the White House.
[Trump's tariffs and his hostile posturing towards our trade partners pose a bigger threat to US deficits than the liberal spending of any Dem admin, ever. I believe quite a bit in Stephanie Kelton's deficit myth, certainly as it pertains to military spending, but to my understanding global demand for the dollar, which Grump threatens and has reduced, insures our deficit.]
2. Deficit concerns don’t constitute a case against tax cuts for the rich, because they will unleash massive growth and generate revenues that more than offset those lost to the tax cuts.
[Zombie economics. This has been discredited for decades by economists like Krugman but remains fundamentalist creed to the rich business classes, for obvious reason.]
3. But deficit concerns do require deep cuts to the social safety net, which won’t hurt the truly needy because they’re largely aimed at targeting the fraud that’s riddling the system and creating a massive class of welfare parasites.
[Austerity for the many is socialism for the rich. The government must insure for everyone-- national security, public safety, housing, food security, education, health care, child care, senior care, etc-- what private markets, unregulated, provide only to a privileged few in the economy who can afford these services. Is there waste in gov, of course, but does that waste hold a candle to the waste accrued by billionaires? No. It is looking increasingly like DOGE is going to cost more than it saved, and still it is being celebrated by repub officials. The three-legged scam makes the rich richer and poor poorer. That's it.]
Greg Sargent @ TNR came up with the Three-Legged Scam. I'm the italics.
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