Top Republicans Keep Talking About Plans To Cut Medicare And Social Security

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/scalise-mccarthy-medicare-social-security-debt-ceiling

Generally, three weeks before midterm elections that could make or break a party’s chances of congressional control, lawmakers emphasize the popular parts of their agenda. But for Republicans this year, not so.

For a few weeks now, they’ve been open about their intention to hold the debt ceiling hostage, a tactic they’ve used repeatedly since Tea Party Republicans tried it out in 2011. It works more or less the same way each time: Republican lawmakers say they will not vote to raise or suspend the debt ceiling, threatening to let the United States default on its debts, which would almost certainly trigger a global economic crisis. In exchange, they demand political concessions from the Democratic President.

This time, they’re planning to demand cuts to Medicare and Social Security — a policy position so staggeringly unpopular, one would expect them to keep it shelved until after they’d procured enough votes to enact it.

House Republicans, some of whom are poised to take over major committees in the case of a congressional flip, have been open about this intent both in interviews and, in terms of their desired changes to the programs, in the Republican Study Committee budget released earlier this year.

*snip*

[tblue37]

1. They feel invulnerable because they figure the fix is in.

[Diamond_Dog]

2. Where was their outrage over government spending

When their orange lord and master spent record amounts on all his favorite initiatives like tax cuts for his rich pals?

[BlueIdaho]

3. Debt Default is not a friend of the GQP.

Time and time again they crash the government thinking they will reap some imagined reward of this kamikaze stunt and each time they pay the price from an angry electorate.