Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Trump's Threat to the Status Quo


Looking at the headline of a recent Vox article touting Sanders Plan, it could easily be read as 95% of us gang up on the top 5%, so we let's raise taxes that way.  

 Sure, well, it's either that, or, we gang up on the middle class, or that fellow behind the tree.  The politics as usual is to raise taxes.   


Raising taxes any amount always has the same effect: it grows the size of the government.  Any job the government does, the job costs money.

But a simple question: What is the number one mission of any government agency?  Is the FBI's primary concern justice, or is the FBI more interested in its own survival? 

It is the latter.  Preservation and Growth of the Agency.  The number one mission of the Federal Government, like all governmental entities, is to grow itself.  Even Reagan, the great conservative, could not shrink government. 

Our federal government is already so strong it controls half the world with its military, and about half the economy of the U.S. 

To give you an idea of its reach, most of the stock market public companies success rides on its good graces with the government.  It's control of the market is so broad, it's no longer wise to invest in market, in the face of an arbitrary and capricious decision of appointed cronies.  Isn't half the world enough? No, the behemoth will devour everything in its path on the way to socialism.  So big, that, there will come a time to leave the US to escape it, before it becomes oppressive.  Perhaps in our lifetime.

Then there will be an overthrow of the government,  that is the only way to shrink it. Alternatively, at some point the federal behemoth might self destruct through sheer bloating.  Hopefully, we are still a ways away from that, yet it is possible.

Federal Government Behemoth
Democrats and Republicans alike, they all understand the behemoth concept.  They compete to see who is is "at the helm" of the behemoth, how much to feed it (in taxes) with full knowledge it will devour anything in its path. The differences in Democrats and Republicans is pretty much nil considering the damage the behemoth does devouring the economy.   They all compete and collaborate on who will get the choicest federal contracts, jobs and authority. 

It's a big comfortable ship, full of do-nothing jobs, the government is.  From politicians down to lunch ladies, everyone in it rides a gravy train of benefits. 

Yet, Trump threatens this backscratching status quo.  He threatens to start holding people accountable.  That's what he does.  He holds people accountable. 

The Feds have taken notice of Trump, and fed employees, politicians, contractors of all kinds, are dependent on the gravy train.  So please excuse them in this election.  There's something more at stake here, besides socialism.  Peoples phony-baloney Jobs are Threatened! Nothing brings the full might and weight of the federal government at you than threatening a government job, as this Mel Brooks bit from Blazing Saddles illustrates. 

While Trump isn't afraid to fire people, he threatens the behemoth.  And it is turning its full weight against Trump now, which explains in part why so many Republican Insiders are now, all of a sudden, coming out against Trump.  These people are part of the Behemoth, they depend on it for their livelihood.  As such, they might actually prefer Hillary, because, at least with HRC, they know what they will get.
  
A bigger behemoth.  Much bigger.

2 comments:

John Branch said...

You write, "The number one mission of the Federal Government, like all governmental entities, is to grow itself. Even Reagan, the great conservative, could not shrink government." To me, that's a big reason to doubt that Donald Trump will manage to do it. Should one hope for the best but not be surprised if (assuming he's elected) he fails to reduce anything? I don't know how much he's playing up this particular issue anyway (I confess to being ill-informed on a lot of details), but I wonder whether it could cost him later; it didn't seem to cost Reagan much, but he was, in most views, special that way.

For the sake of honesty, I should say that I'm asking hypothetically. A part of me leans toward limited government and even toward libertarianism, but another part of me does not. Or call it a historical question. When Candidate X promises to change Washington, what more often happens is that Washington changes Candidate X.

Bob Cosmos said...

He may not shrink government, but he will hold it more accountable than Hillary.