Who are these guys - Butch & The Kid?

Who are these guys? This is not a flashback to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. No I’m talking about President Trump and the Republican Party?

Now I’m a man of the Left, as you might have gathered, but I’ve always felt a little more secure knowing that if my tribe happened to overspend, as has happened, then my brethren on the Right will be there bewailing rising deficits, crippling interest payments, and other fiscal calamities.

Being somewhat of a Keynesian in matters economic, I believe that during times of high unemployment, deflation, or catastrophe, it behooves the government to invest in infrastructure, thereby putting people back to work and giving the economy a jumpstart.

Generally speaking this economic “goosing” tends to work, though it can take time and much verbal lashing from the Right. 

And sometimes the Right is right! In a rush to pump money into the economy, there is often waste and overspending.

That’s why the recent about-turn by the Republican Party is so troubling. The GOP abandoned its loathing of deficits, along with its fear of “crippling future generations with debt,” and all at the behest of the two mighty “M’s” – Mnuchin and Mulvaney.

These two gentlemen are currently advising us that if we cut taxes for corporations these institutions will be so grateful they will spread their already massive largesse among the rest of us.

Not only that but there will be a surge of economic growth, the like of which we haven’t seen since the invention of the wheelbarrow; in fact, we’ll all be riding the gravy train like Mr. Mnuchin and his one-percent colleague, Gary Cohn, chief economic adviser to President Trump, who is reputed to have declared, “only morons pay the estate tax.”

Well he did work at Goldman Sachs so he should know. Or should he? Tinkering with stocks and bonds hardly qualifies you to expand a rapidly changing service and high tech economy that already boasts a minimal 4.1% unemployment rate.

However, such experience will help in managing debt, and there’ll be plenty of that. These Goldman Sachs alumni can share their expertise with our president, aka “the King of Debt” who also has intimate knowledge of the nation’s bankruptcy laws.

As for the bould Mick Mulvaney – he used to be one our foremost budget hawks. During the Obama administration he preached undying frugality and fiscal restaint. During the Great Recession he fought tooth and nail against federal infrastructure and research spending, as it would add to the national debt of $10trillion. Hey Mick, guess what. That debt is now well over 20trill.

Fiscal probity how are you! Let’s risk it all on one big throw of the dice. Add a trillion and a half more in tax cuts, and growth will pay for it. But let’s add a national novena to St. Jude for interest rates to remain flat. Could be hard servicing all these trillions in debt if rates rise – as they eventually will.

Hey, I like a little flutter at the track now and again, but I’m always careful to have bus, train, or even taxi fare home. If the Mnuchin-Mulvaney gamble fails, I’ll be hitching to Manhattan from Belmont.

By the way, has anyone reminded these whiz kids that corporate profits have been sky high for years, and corporate coffers are full of cash both here and abroad, yet wages continue to barely keep up with inflation? 

Does anyone really believe that increased corporate gain will trickle down to America’s workers? When was the last time you got a meaningful raise? 

And so we wait, certain of only one thing – the Big Man on Pennsylvania Avenue needs a legislative victory before the balls fall off the Christmas tree. Talk about government by Santa Claus!

But where will the Big Man be when the deficit balloons in the coming years?

Not to worry, he’ll blame it on Hillary Clinton, when he’s not engaged in trading insults with the other hair maven, Kim Jong-un. 

Or maybe, just maybe, some Republican Senators and Congressmen will come to their conservative senses and start worrying about exploding deficits again. 

Ah well, there’s always Santa Claus.