- House Republicans cave — again…
- A lone voice for fiscal chastity…
- April 15 is just days away! If you haven’t filed yet, you need to learn about this loophole that can LEGALLY save you thousands in taxes this year
Dear Reader,
Tariffs are on one day… tariffs off. Stocks are up one day… stocks are down the next.
I cannot keep pace. And the frenzied motion dizzies my senses.
So today we step off the swinging see-saw.
We confine ourselves instead to the far more stable. And the far more predictable.
That topic reduces to political cowardice — and prodigious government spending.
National Review, yesterday:
- House Republicans narrowly passed the budget blueprint for this year’s reconciliation legislation in a 216 to 214 vote, staving off a rebellion from fiscal hawks who had threatened to torpedo the legislation over the frustrations with the Senate GOP’s spending-cut targets.
- Thursday’s budget vote means Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John can move forward on President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” which lawmakers plan to pass through budget reconciliation, a process that allows them to skirt the Senate’s 60-vote threshold for passing legislation…
- While the Senate’s plan retains the House’s own directives to its panels to reach specific targets for reducing the deficit, it undermines the $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion in spending reductions House Republicans have mandated to balance out tax cuts.
It’s Never the Right Time to Cut Spending
As always, Republicans assure us they must cede ground today… so that they can stand their ground tomorrow.
As I have argued previously: “Lord, make me chaste, but not yet” is their eternal plea.
When presented with the opportunity to embrace chastity… they succumb instead to promiscuity.
It is never quite time for chastity. Again, we hear, for example, that:
“We have to start thinking about the midterm elections now. We can’t cut spending now because it’ll cost us in the midterms. We’ll do it once the midterms are over.”
The midterm elections pass. Republicans win. They are subsequently free to request chastity of the Lord — chastity today.
Yet the temptations of the flesh seduce them… and they cannot put forth the request.
Additional excuses come issuing:
“Well, we have to think about the next presidential election. Cutting popular spending programs could cost us the election — and THIS is the most important presidential election in history. We can’t chance it. We’ll cut spending once we win the White House.”
Same Old, Same Old
Assume their candidate wins the White House. Next comes the return of argument A about the midterm elections.
Then comes argument B about the next presidential election.
On and on the business goes in inevitable yet frustrating succession.
It is eternally chastity tomorrow. It is eternally promiscuity today.
Thus we return to National Review:
- “It is time for us to act so that we can get on with the real work,” Representative Kevin Hern (R., Okla.) said on the House floor. “In passing this budget framework, we are unlocking the process to deliver on unleashing American energy production, permanently securing our southern and northern borders, and making tax cuts permanent for small businesses and working families.”
- Speaking with reporters on Thursday, holdouts said they voted for the budget blueprint only after getting reassurances from congressional GOP leaders that the final bill will include higher spending cuts than those outlined in the resolution.
Just so. Yet I refer you to my comments above.
I’m Willing to Wager
GOP leadership’s reassurances of future spending cuts will yield to the identical dynamic — depend on it.
I will devour each and every word upon this page if mistaken… without salt, without butter… without liquid to help the bitter meal down the chute.
I have observed too many promises made. And too many promises fractured.
That is, I have observed the nearly universal triumph of promiscuity over chastity.
And I have little reason to expect the arrangement to swing.
On such instances I seek the virtuous utterings of Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY).
A Voice for Chastity
Here is a fellow willing to undergo the rigors of chastity today. From whom:
- If you were trying to hasten financial collapse of our country and bribe voters to go along with it, the strategy wouldn’t look much different than what Congress is doing today.
- The big beautiful bill cuts taxes while keeping spending on an increasingly unsustainable trajectory.
“When a woman has lost her chastity she will shrink from nothing,” argued the Roman historian Tacitus.
So too with politicians.
They have abandoned their chastity.
Thus they shrink from nothing.
Yet in shrinking from nothing — in paradox — they shrink from everything.
Brian Maher
for Freedom Financial News
