Bill Maher is hit and miss on a lot of things with me, but when he's on, he's often really ON. And this is a good example, where Maher gives an illustration of the 21st Century GOP motto: "Our rules and standards don't apply to us." With a special appearance by our own Lyin' Ryan!
Look at how this applies in Wisconsin. Scott Walker has talked for 6 years about "free markets" and how tax cuts and wage suppression have made Wisconsin "open for business." But instead of relying on those tools to lure Foxconn, his plan is to hand out BAGS OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS as Foxconn builds its factory and hires people. And few people point out that the Walker Admin is admitting that it's prior measures have failed, which is why they are going to the next step of selective subsidies for economic activity. It's such an obvious example of government picking winners and losers that even the Kochs' Americans for Prosperity came out this week and said the Fox-con was a bad idea.
Let's also remember that Scott Walker got elected in 2010 complaining about the federal government paying $800 million to install high-speed rail between the Twin Cities, Madison, Milwaukee, and Chicago. But now that Wisconsin has some of the worst roads in America, and Walker is more concerned with getting on the wrong side of DC lobbyist Grover Norquist instead of FIXING THEM, Walker wants hundreds of millions of dollars from the Trump Administration to bail him out on these road projects.
And Walker asked for that DC bailout less than one month after supporting a constitutional convention to require that the Federal Government have a balanced budget, yet now is asking for a DC roads bailout that would drive up the federal budget deficit. Likewise, Robbin' Vos and the Assembly GOP voted for that Constitutional Convention, but now don't seem to have a problem with borrowing big money for roads, as long as it fixes I-94 as part of the Fox-con. Yes, you may note that the $252 million only is released if federal money is helping to pay for it. But that federal money could come from ANY source, including taking away from other federally-assisted projects throughout the state.
Speaking of the US budget deficit, that's back on the rise in 2017, and yet this week we saw Lyin' Ryan and Mitch McConnell say they wanted to raise the debt ceiling without requiring spending cuts. That's the exact opposite of what they chose to do in 2011, and it led to the US having its credit rating downgraded. What's the difference in 2017, other than the party and skin color of the president?
It's not even the obvious hypocrisy that angers me so much about this. It's the shamelessness in the way that Walker and Ryan do it, and the weak-mindedness of the average Republican voter to lay back and take it. I'm so sick and tired of us on the left having to act twice as good as our opponents, because GOP dishonesty is considered acceptable by our media and the average dope, instead of being called out and laughed off the stage.
This double-standard's gotta end, and "going higher" isn't the answer to this problem.
"would drive up the federal budget deficit"
ReplyDelete"could come from ANY source, including taking away from other federally-assisted projects"
But still all roads, right? And if they robbed Peter to pay Paul, they could still skate by Grover's eye, and just ignore whichever small constituency didn't get their road upgrade, like I-90 from border to Madison...