America - The Battle Begins

Last night, Donald Trump gave a fine speech to Congress, laying out a clear plan. Now, he has to get it past Congress. The Democrats will vote against anything he proposes. Well, you say, the Republicans control Congress.

True, but many don't like what he proposes. Let's look at a few items. He wants to increase defense spending and lower taxes. How? By cutting certain social programs. The GOP leaders want to attack Social Security and Medicare, Trump ha vowed not to do that. Instead he wants sharp reductions in EPA funding, IRS funding, student loan programs, and medical research funding. The EPA and IRS are beaurocratic nightmares. He might get those reductions through. Student loans make parents, otherwise known as voters, happy, so that will be tough. In fact, any parent who is remotely sane and cannot afford the ridiculous prices of many colleges, will insist that the kids go to a Community College. Then, if they do well, they can transfer to a relatively low cost State school and, thus enter their adult life without a mountain of debt.

Medical research is a huge, fat cow. Of course we want to cure diseases and big Pharmaceutical companies lead the research. The folks make unthinkable amounts of money and have no need for research subsidies. They do not need this. In addition, there are a plethora of private charities supportin research on various diseases. We do not need tax money given to these projects,  but, as I will explain soon, Congress needs the money kicjed back by big drugs to keep their seats.

Trump also wants to cut foreign aid and that ha startled many neo-cons, such as McConnell and Rubio. Well, we now have President who dies not want to play Risk, the game of Global Conquest that Republicans have been at for years. If you stop the game, why do we need the foreign aid? If we have to buy friends, they are not friends. To help the poor in those lands? No. Most aid money goes immediately in the pockets of the leaders, enabling them  to live lives of luxury and to build massive armies. We do not want impoverished, backward nations to have big militaries. We did that in Afghanistan with the Taliban when they fought Russia and, in the long run, that has been a disaster.

The truth is, the programs Trump wants to cit bring money back to our elected representatives, in the form of campaign contributions, They cannot keep their seats without it and Lord knows they are loathe to give up their power. That is sick and one reason why we need term limits.