‘Take the Policies’? Seriously?
It took less than a week after polls closed on the Pacific Coast for Donald Trump to announce of candidacy (NBC). The Republican Party’s will-we-or-won’t-we psychodrama is already in full swing.
Of course, some have already made their decision. I am not surprised that brutal pragmatists like my Bearing Drift colleague Chris Saxman are attempting to turn Trump into Nicky Santoro (I join Sax in loving a good Godfather quote, but Casino deserves its due). What puzzled me was Sax’s prescription for what ails the GOP.
Trump’s done.
Policy achievement notwithstanding, it’s time for the GOP to move on to its new generation of leaders.
Wait … what? “Policy achievement notwithstanding”? Did I miss something?
Let’s go over the “achievement” list, shall we?
- Government Spending: Putting aside the COVID emergency, government spending still grew at over 5% a year from 2017 to 2019; faster than during the Obama Administration. To be clear, that’s spending only; it does not include any effect on the budget from the 2017 tax cut. Speaking of….
- Tax policy: The 2017 tax cut is arguably the closest Trumpism and pre-Trump Republicans came to each other. That didn’t mean either got it right. Learning all the wrong lessons from the aughts, they made individual tax rate reductions temporary and the overall tax code more complex. This was literally the exact opposite of Reagan’s 1986 tax reforms. Meanwhile the tax reductions were countered with….
- Tariffs and Trade Wars: This is where Trump made his darkest imprint on his party and the country. Combining his racism, hatred of our allies, and economic insanity, Trump slapped tariffs on imports whenever it suited him. He even begged the Chinese Communist regime to let him keep the tariffs in place as part of his disastrous trade deal with them. For anyone skeptical at how bad this all was, remember that the 2020 recession began in February – before the COVID lockdowns. It wasn’t the virus that sank our economy; it was Trump.
- Cozying up to the Taliban: Trump may like us to forget, but it was his deal with the Taliban that led to America’s withdrawal. You can argue (as I have), that Biden should have ripped the agreement up when he took office. That doesn’t make Trump any less responsible.
Keep in mind, these are what Trump would consider successes. I haven’t even bothered with what he wanted to do but couldn’t: wall off the Rio Grande without providing any government infrastructure that could be bring order to the border, turn Ukraine into a client state of Rudy Giuliani and Vladimir Putin, etc.
