My congressman (Ted Lieu, Democrat of Los Angeles) just indicated he was a "no" on the budget. Does this move the needle in any way, shape or form, or is it just posturing?
I'm sure someone else has commented to this effect already, but they are killing off the Energy Department’s ability to use the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to stabilize oil prices because, if you can't draw down the reserve to stabalize prices, you're forced to drill more to stabalize prices. Drill baby, drill.
Can someone who's not as ignorant as I am on macroeconomics explain the expected net inflationary impact here? If you're adding to the deficit via tax cuts, isn't that the same as amping up government spending? And doesn't everyone agree now (even if they don't say it out loud) that the covid-era stimulus overshot the mark and helped drive the inflation that sank Biden?
I don't think Trump gives a shit about the welfare of the country, but he does seem to care about his "ratings." And I think too many economically illiterate liberals have duped ourselves into believing the economic benefits of tax cuts are totally made up; the stimulus is real, at least in the short term, even if it's ultimately bad policy. So from a short-term perspective (ie, until 2028), will this bill have the desired effect of boosting the economy? (And even if it does, will that not come at an inflationary cost?)
Regarding point #8, I wish someone on the right could take the courageous position that electrification/nuclear/renewables is about personal autonomy first and foremost. Reduce reliance on foreign oil, oil corps, and government-owned utilities.
Many excellent points about the dangers of the deficit, and a couple about how fewer people may not have insurance coverage.
Please explain how to reduce the deficit without costing someone somewhere. Raising taxes doesn’t qualify, because more revenue always means new and expanded programs.
A couple weeks ago, pro-tariff, pro-DOGE people justified themselves by our national debt emergency. I wonder if any of them are less worried now.
That being said, I've mentioned before that I canvassed in extremely poor neighborhoods for Kamala. I met a ton of elderly people with serious medical conditions, and they were almost all voting for Trump. So this is a bit of a hot stove moment for me. 🤷🏻♀️
This breakdown is solid—as usual, you expose how deep the GOP’s economic cruelty runs. But there’s a missing piece in almost every pro-democracy analysis: how they get away with it.
The brutal budget cuts, the Medicaid rollbacks, the climate sabotage—none of it happens without a generation of voters being trained to think “both sides are the same,” “the system is rigged,” and “burn it all down” is a moral stance.
That training didn’t just come from Fox News. It came from a decade of left-populist influencers—Glenn Greenwald, Jimmy Dore, Briahna Joy Gray, Cornel West, even parts of TYT—who told millions that liberalism was the real enemy, not fascism.
And it's working. Over the weekend at a Mother’s Day gathering, my wife tried—gently—to raise concern about NPR’s future under Trump. Her father tried to raise concern about what Trump would do to the VA. The result? Two of her cousins (both half-Jewish women), one a leftist artist, the other a veteran raising two Black children, fled the lunch.
The artist muttered something chilling about “MAGA and the working class locking arms when shit really goes down.” The veteran said nothing—just left. The message from both: don’t talk about it. Don't even try. They’ve absorbed so much cynicism, so much populist suspicion, that engaging is seen as pointless—or dangerous.
This isn’t apathy. It’s learned helplessness, engineered by a decade of anti-democratic populist rhetoric on both sides.
That’s the left-to-MAGA pipeline—and it’s not fringe anymore. It’s mainstream online culture.
Until more pro-democracy voices start naming this trend, calling it out, and confronting the media ecosystem that fuels it, this cycle of sabotage will keep repeating.
I’m trying to chart this out clearly in my own project:
That sounds awful, I’m sorry…except I don’t quite understand what the cousins’ objection was. They want NPR and the VA to be torched? They like what Trump is doing? I’m not connecting the dots here.
Sorry 4 the delay. Political discourse is kryptonite to both cousins. One is a pro-Palestine protester whose entire identity has become "Israel = Genocide = Zionism = evil", but beyond that equation, which she barks out in talking points, not inviting any questions, counter-arguments, or comments, she's not only averse to discussing the history of the conflict, the importance of democracy, and/or pretty much anything at all political; she breaks down into tremors of anguish, fear, and fury.
The other, the vet, is similar, works as a manager at one of the broligarch's companies and has borderline personality disorder. Is equally averse to any discussion about politics, but especially when anyone suggests that Democrats might actually be better for humanity than Republicans. Complicating this more is that the army veteran Black father of her children is just like her: quietly signals his maga sympathies, by never "going there."
There are no dots to connect. None of it makes sense. Unless as a screenplay for some new Jordan Peele movie.
One of my best friends, Matt, is a guy I've known for decades and a member of my old Sunday school class back in Fort Worth. He's an attorney and a conservative Republican who supports Trump. One of his big issues is the deficit. This column would be perfect for him, but it's useless to me with this "really shitty" headline.
They only like nuclear to the extent it deflects from climate change denialism.
Every single person on Earth has seen the weather change in their lifetime, so if you directly ask a climate change denialist about this, they usually pivot to nuclear.
Trump just met with a bunch of oil producing countries and one gave Trump a plane so I can think of 747 reasons Republicans might now oppose alternatives to fossil fuels.
I can easily edit profanity out of an excerpt when I post it with a link. No problem. But I can't edit profanity out of a shitty headline. And so I don't post excerpts from columns with shitty headlines. I'd appreciate it if you'd keep your headlines G rated.
I am starting to think about tDrumpf's foreign policy where he wants to let Europe, Russia, China and India have their spheres of influence and the US will just do North and South Murika. Seen in that light, the pot of gold at the end of budget is the War Dept budget. Just think of the size of the tax cuts for the rich that that policy could make possible. As a bank robber once said go where the money is.
My congressman (Ted Lieu, Democrat of Los Angeles) just indicated he was a "no" on the budget. Does this move the needle in any way, shape or form, or is it just posturing?
Where can I read more about this budget's impact on advanced nuclear?
A couple of comments are saying this bill can't pass (as-is) so it's more of a wishlist.
I'm sure someone else has commented to this effect already, but they are killing off the Energy Department’s ability to use the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to stabilize oil prices because, if you can't draw down the reserve to stabalize prices, you're forced to drill more to stabalize prices. Drill baby, drill.
This is just normal Republican stuff, too-not even especially MAGA driven.
MAGA is just tremendously evil. Hard to come up with any other explanation.
Can someone who's not as ignorant as I am on macroeconomics explain the expected net inflationary impact here? If you're adding to the deficit via tax cuts, isn't that the same as amping up government spending? And doesn't everyone agree now (even if they don't say it out loud) that the covid-era stimulus overshot the mark and helped drive the inflation that sank Biden?
I don't think Trump gives a shit about the welfare of the country, but he does seem to care about his "ratings." And I think too many economically illiterate liberals have duped ourselves into believing the economic benefits of tax cuts are totally made up; the stimulus is real, at least in the short term, even if it's ultimately bad policy. So from a short-term perspective (ie, until 2028), will this bill have the desired effect of boosting the economy? (And even if it does, will that not come at an inflationary cost?)
Regarding point #8, I wish someone on the right could take the courageous position that electrification/nuclear/renewables is about personal autonomy first and foremost. Reduce reliance on foreign oil, oil corps, and government-owned utilities.
How many genders are there?
Many excellent points about the dangers of the deficit, and a couple about how fewer people may not have insurance coverage.
Please explain how to reduce the deficit without costing someone somewhere. Raising taxes doesn’t qualify, because more revenue always means new and expanded programs.
A couple weeks ago, pro-tariff, pro-DOGE people justified themselves by our national debt emergency. I wonder if any of them are less worried now.
That being said, I've mentioned before that I canvassed in extremely poor neighborhoods for Kamala. I met a ton of elderly people with serious medical conditions, and they were almost all voting for Trump. So this is a bit of a hot stove moment for me. 🤷🏻♀️
What are the odds this will be passed?
This breakdown is solid—as usual, you expose how deep the GOP’s economic cruelty runs. But there’s a missing piece in almost every pro-democracy analysis: how they get away with it.
The brutal budget cuts, the Medicaid rollbacks, the climate sabotage—none of it happens without a generation of voters being trained to think “both sides are the same,” “the system is rigged,” and “burn it all down” is a moral stance.
That training didn’t just come from Fox News. It came from a decade of left-populist influencers—Glenn Greenwald, Jimmy Dore, Briahna Joy Gray, Cornel West, even parts of TYT—who told millions that liberalism was the real enemy, not fascism.
And it's working. Over the weekend at a Mother’s Day gathering, my wife tried—gently—to raise concern about NPR’s future under Trump. Her father tried to raise concern about what Trump would do to the VA. The result? Two of her cousins (both half-Jewish women), one a leftist artist, the other a veteran raising two Black children, fled the lunch.
The artist muttered something chilling about “MAGA and the working class locking arms when shit really goes down.” The veteran said nothing—just left. The message from both: don’t talk about it. Don't even try. They’ve absorbed so much cynicism, so much populist suspicion, that engaging is seen as pointless—or dangerous.
This isn’t apathy. It’s learned helplessness, engineered by a decade of anti-democratic populist rhetoric on both sides.
That’s the left-to-MAGA pipeline—and it’s not fringe anymore. It’s mainstream online culture.
Until more pro-democracy voices start naming this trend, calling it out, and confronting the media ecosystem that fuels it, this cycle of sabotage will keep repeating.
I’m trying to chart this out clearly in my own project:
https://tinyurl.com/r3uw29b9
That sounds awful, I’m sorry…except I don’t quite understand what the cousins’ objection was. They want NPR and the VA to be torched? They like what Trump is doing? I’m not connecting the dots here.
Sorry 4 the delay. Political discourse is kryptonite to both cousins. One is a pro-Palestine protester whose entire identity has become "Israel = Genocide = Zionism = evil", but beyond that equation, which she barks out in talking points, not inviting any questions, counter-arguments, or comments, she's not only averse to discussing the history of the conflict, the importance of democracy, and/or pretty much anything at all political; she breaks down into tremors of anguish, fear, and fury.
The other, the vet, is similar, works as a manager at one of the broligarch's companies and has borderline personality disorder. Is equally averse to any discussion about politics, but especially when anyone suggests that Democrats might actually be better for humanity than Republicans. Complicating this more is that the army veteran Black father of her children is just like her: quietly signals his maga sympathies, by never "going there."
There are no dots to connect. None of it makes sense. Unless as a screenplay for some new Jordan Peele movie.
It's the difference between *theoretically* engaging with the right wing, and *actually* engaging with the right wing.
:-|
One of my best friends, Matt, is a guy I've known for decades and a member of my old Sunday school class back in Fort Worth. He's an attorney and a conservative Republican who supports Trump. One of his big issues is the deficit. This column would be perfect for him, but it's useless to me with this "really shitty" headline.
Thanks for your consideration.
Is he 7 years old?
How are Republicans against nuclear now? Is this some horseshoe MAHA thing?
They only like nuclear to the extent it deflects from climate change denialism.
Every single person on Earth has seen the weather change in their lifetime, so if you directly ask a climate change denialist about this, they usually pivot to nuclear.
But that's not wrong. Like that's an actual solution.
Right, but nuclear only comes up in that context. When left to their own devices, they only like fossil fuels.
Trump just met with a bunch of oil producing countries and one gave Trump a plane so I can think of 747 reasons Republicans might now oppose alternatives to fossil fuels.
Hey Matt.
I can easily edit profanity out of an excerpt when I post it with a link. No problem. But I can't edit profanity out of a shitty headline. And so I don't post excerpts from columns with shitty headlines. I'd appreciate it if you'd keep your headlines G rated.
Thanks for your consideration.
I am starting to think about tDrumpf's foreign policy where he wants to let Europe, Russia, China and India have their spheres of influence and the US will just do North and South Murika. Seen in that light, the pot of gold at the end of budget is the War Dept budget. Just think of the size of the tax cuts for the rich that that policy could make possible. As a bank robber once said go where the money is.