Washington Post Shocked at GOP Turnaround on the Deficit

This is from the 2012 Republican convention. Good times.Tampa Bay Times/ZUMAPRESS

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Goodness me:

Republican lawmakers in 2011 brought the U.S. government to the brink of default, refused to raise the debt ceiling, demanded huge spending cuts, and insisted on a constitutional amendment to balance the budget.

On Wednesday, they formally broke free from those fiscal principles and announced a plan that would add $500 billion in new spending over two years and suspend the debt ceiling until 2019. This came several months after Republicans passed a tax law that would add more than $1 trillion to the debt over a decade.

With all these changes, the annual gap between spending and revenue in 2019 is projected to eclipse $1.1 trillion, up from $439 billion in 2015….The debt binge caps off a major reversal for the Republican Party, which has been swept up by President Trump’s demands for more spending and tax cuts at a time when the public seems to care less about debt than it has in years.

The wide-eyed tone of this story really grates. Republicans always care about the deficit when a Democrat is president. They always stop caring when a Republican is in office. And the public “seems” to care less about the debt because Republicans aren’t filling the airwaves with debt clocks and dire warnings that we’re going the way of Zimbabwe.

Come on, folks.

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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