Tag: Hiram Johnson

Politicians often avoid the truth because it can be unpopular. “It’s disappointing, but it’s not a Republican problem,” McConnell said. Everyone from budget hawk conservatives to big spending liberals can reasonably agree that the significant decline in revenue from corporate tax collections because of the rate reduction contained in the 2017 tax plan contributed to the spike in the deficit, to $779 billion. However, McConnell is absolutely correct that Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds are in deep trouble. The non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget reports that these entitlement program trust funds “will all be exhausted by 2032 without action to stabilize their finances.” Congress doesn’t want to tackle entitlement reform because it means hard choices—reduce benefits, raise the retirement age, increase taxes. McConnell’s mere suggestion of the importance of reforms fed neatly into the Democrats mantra this election cycle that Republicans want to cut healthcare. Politico reported Manchin claimed Morrisey would curtail benefits “in a heartbeat.” Morrisey pushed back, calling Manchin, “one of the most dishonest politicians you are going to find.” But back to McConnell. He also said having one party in charge of the White House, the House and Senate is not conducive to entitlement reform because neither party is going to be willing to take full ownership of the difficult choices. “I think it’s pretty safe to say that entitlement changes, which is the real driver of the debt by any objective standard, may well be difficult if not impossible to achieve when you have unified government.” That’s unpopular truth-telling from McConnell, and something that Republicans don’t want to hear two weeks before the election when they are trying to hold their advantage in the Senate and avoid losing a majority in the House. But today entitlement reform is more of a political weapon.