Trump Ready To Get His Revenge Against Iowans

On February 1, 2016, the day of the Iowa caucuses, Trump was still just a joke. He was sputtering that Iowa Republicans had brain damage from too much fertilizer after polls started showing him losing to Ben Carson and Ted Cruz. On the day of the caucuses Cruz won-- with 51,666 (27.6%). Trump came in second with 45,429 votes (24.3%), much closer to Rubio's 43,228 (23.1%) than to Cruz. Trump, who did beat Carson-- currently his Secretary of Housing-- was still basically a stand-up comic back then:



Though Obama won Iowa both times he ran-- 54-44% against McCain and 52-46% against Romney-- Hillary couldn't have been a worse fit for the state. She lost the state's 6 e;sectoral votes by almost 10 points-- 800,983 (51.1%) for Trumpanzee to 653,669 (41.9). Trump has still never apologized to the state's rural voters for repeatedly accusing them of being stupid and brain-damaged. And his new budget is particularly devastating for Iowans.

Forget for a moment how TrumpCare will be catastrophic for a state that has already utterly sabotaged the Affordable Care Act. And lets not think about what the draconian cuts in food stamps will do to Iowa's farmers. The Trump budget, if ever enacted, will completely eliminate 66 federal programs, several of which are vital for Iowa's economy and well-being. For starters Mulvaney has slashed the Agriculture Department mercilessly and completely eliminated nearly a billion dollars by ending 4 programs that benefit Iowans: the Rural Water and Waste Disposal Program Account, the Rural Business-Cooperative Service, the Single Family Housing Direct Loans, the McGovern-Dole International Food for Education. Other programs being eliminated include the Commerce Department's Economic Development Administration, the Labor Department's Migrant and Seasonal Farmworker Training and their Senior Community Service Employment Program, Health and Human Service's Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program-- for those cold Iowa winters-- even Homeland Security's Flood Hazard Mapping and Risk Analysis Program. Also the over $4 billion cut from the State Department's aid programs will be disatrous for farmers, since much of that aid is in the form of surplus agricultural products that will otherwise flood domestic markets driving down prices. Trump manages to save $43 million by shutting down the Treasury Department's Global Agriculture and Food Security Program.

And, as you've probably read, some of ind independent agency's Trump and Mulvaney are targeting for elimination especially serve rural communities, like the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency.

Even as much a knee-jerk Trump supporter as Chuck Grassley (R-IA) is, even he admits he's concerned about some of the Trump cuts that target farmers and rural communities. Iowa Public Radio reported that Grassely is bitching that, although he doesn't especially care about Trump and Mulvaney further squeezing the food stamps program, "reducing crop insurance subsidies would leave taxpayers on the hook to pay for farm damages from natural disasters... Isn’t it better to have the farmers pay part of it and the taxpayers pay part of it instead of the taxpayers paying 100 percent, like they do for other natural disasters, like hurricanes and earthquakes?"

Dave Loebsack, the only Democrat left in Iowa's delegation to Washington said "this budget is a direct attack on Iowa’s hardworking families, rural communities and small businesses, all while giving more and more to those who are wealthy and well." Although all of Iowa's Trump puppets in DC have taken an uncomfortably supportive posture towards the budget, other Republicans around the country are denouncing it. Nevada Republican Dean Heller is already using it as a piñata in his reelection campaign. "From slashing funding for important public lands programs to its renewed effort to revive the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, the President’s budget request contains several anti-Nevada provisions." That's strong stuff. John Cornyn, the Senate's #2 Republican pronounced it "DOA-- dead on arrival." By the end of the week, expect frightened Republicans in Iowa-- Rod Blum and David Young-- to start cautiously backing away, especially once local polling shows how unpopular Trump's proposals are.