The wreckage that Joe Biden might inherit in November

[Zorro]

Like some medieval warlord on the verge of ruin, President Trump is burning the harvest and salting the fields. He seems determined to leave behind a broken nation.

No one should take for granted that Trump will lose to Joe Biden in November. But the more likely this result appears to be, the more clearly we can see the wreckage that Biden would inherit. Trump’s tenure has been a disaster all along, but as Election Day approaches things are getting worse — with long-term implications that are dire.

The smoke-and-mirrors executive actions Trump signed this weekend are but the latest example. They don’t actually do anything concrete to help the millions of Americans thrown out of work by the pandemic, with the one exception of extending the moratorium on repayment of student loans, which is a good thing. Beyond that, Trump didn’t really forestall an expected wave of evictions; he just mandated a study of the issue. Trump didn’t really extend the $600-a-week federal supplement to unemployment benefits; he cut it to $300 and demanded that the states, which are basically broke, pony up an additional $100.

But Trump’s deferral of employee payroll tax collection for the rest of the year, for workers making less than $104,000 — which probably is within his power as president — does real damage, all of it gratuitous. It takes away hundreds of billions of dollars from Social Security. And, of course, it helps precisely no one who is unemployed, since to pay payroll taxes one has to be on a payroll.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-wreckage-that-joe-biden-might-inherit-in-november/2020/08/10/8569b59c-db2e-11ea-8051-d5f887d73381_story.html

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. Add two and a half months.

He won't take office until January 20. Meanwhile count on the Republicans to do as much damage as they possibly can. They'll make Sherman's march through Georgia look like a Sunday School picnic.