No where in Government are there more schemes to fool the American people than in legislation that has to do with spending and taxing.
The evergreen con comes in projecting the cost of a program and the anticipated revenues to pay for it. In that game the Democrats are Lucy, of “Peanuts” fame, and we the people are Charlie Brown at the beginning of football season. Lucy makes a promise to tee up the ball every year only to snatch it away at the last moment – sending Charley flat on his back as he goes to kick the ball.
Once again, the Democrats tell us that the HUGE Infrastructure Bill and the even Huge-r Reconciliation Bill will be paid for. And like a bunch of Charlie Browns, too many people believe them – when, in fact, the ultimate cost of the legislation will surpass the initial projections by a LOT and the anticipated revenues will fall far short of the estimate.
Democrats will tell us that most of the new money will come from taxing corporations – even though they know that we the people will wind up paying those taxes in the form of increased prices for goods and services.
Then there is this scam.
The proposed Biden legislation is given a price tag of $3.5 trillion dollars over the next ten years. That is $350 billion dollars per year. That is an enormous amount of money to add to the federal budget. Too much, in fact.
In an effort to reach a compromise, some Democrat leaders are suggesting that they pass a 5-year bill for half that amount – or a mere $17.5 trillion price tag. That amounts to … what? … $350 billion per year.
If you follow what West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin calls the “acceptable” amount of $1.5 trillion dollars, that comes to $150 billion per year. That is still an enormous amount to add to the federal budget each year. Still too much.
The annual expenditure is the most critical number. Why? Because that is how we tax. That is how we budget. That is how we spend. Simply reducing the number of years while keeping the $350 billion annual expenditure is a distinction without a difference. It is a ruse designed to fool the American public.
Whether it is a ten-year expenditure or a five-year expenditure, Democrats are betting that once their menu of socialistic welfare programs are in place, they will never be cancelled. In other words, if they get their $350 billion per year for five years or ten years makes no difference. They will continue ad infinitum.
And even worse, the cost of those programs will continue to increase – meaning that future Congresses will have to appropriate more and more money to keep them going. If you do not understand that dynamic, just check out the cost of Medicare, school loans, food stamps, unemployment compensation and every other federal program over the years.
Do not be fooled. The Biden “Build Back Better” scheme will break the bank, increase the National Debt by trillions of dollars and trigger inflation. But Biden and the Democrats do not care because most of the poop will hit the propeller long after these reckless reprobates are long gone.
There are various levels of proposed spending. Vermont’s self-proclaimed socialist Senator Bernie Sanders would like to make the figure $6 trillion. The Biden package is said to be $3.5 trillion. Manchin sees the ceiling at $1.5 trillion. It is all too much.
The most responsible number? Zero – and it does not matter if you project that for ten years, five years or until the end of the millennium. We can only hope that there are enough responsible members of Congress to kill off Biden’s insane Build Back Broker proposal.
So, there ‘tis
Correction: Kudos to Joseph S. Bruder for finding the typo in the math – the misplaced decimal point. It should have been $1.75 trillion instead of $17.5 trillion. However, the point still stands. Cutting the years from 10 to 5 to get to a $1.75 trillion dollar Bill makes no difference in the annual spending. It is a scam. Mr. Bruder chooses a picayune criticism over a refutation of the major point – as usual.