Bernie Sanders Is The Man Who Gives Me Hope

Balls by Nancy Ohanian

Yesterday, I wrote that Trump is the best-equipped candidate to go up against Trump when the GOP barrage of lies about how great the economy is doing gets puked out across every media outlet in the land. At the same time I was explaining my assertion, Bernie-- as Senate Budget Committee ranking member-- shared his thoughts on Trump's toxic budget. It's worth reading, especially if you haven't decided who tp vote for in November, or if you're considering one of the conservative candidates.

“The Trump Budget for 2021 is a budget of, by, and for the 1 percent. It reflects profoundly unethical priorities and shows that the president is-- and it gives me no great pleasure to say this-- a liar. Just last week, President Trump told the American people in his State of the Union that he would ‘always protect your Medicare’ and ‘always protect your Social Security. Always.’

“Today, President Trump released a budget that cuts Medicare by half a trillion dollars. It cuts Social Security by $24 billion, including an $11 billion cut in Social Security Disability benefits.

“Last week, President Trump’s Medicare and Medicaid chief wrote, ‘No, the Trump administration is not cutting Medicaid.’ But this budget shows the administration’s actual priorities: cutting Medicaid by hundreds of billions of dollars.

“Three days ago, Vice President Pence said higher deficits were necessary for boosting economic growth. Now Trump’s budget uses that same deficit-- which he ran up to cut taxes for the wealthy and inflate a bloated, wasteful Pentagon budget-- as an excuse to cut programs for the most vulnerable people in America.

“The old cliché is that a budget is a moral document. What kind of unbelievable moral framework allowed this White House to propose $182 billion in cuts to nutrition assistance from needy families, when nearly one in seven households with children are food insecure?  The Trump Budget, outrageously, even cuts billions from a program that provides nutrition assistance for pregnant women, new moms, and their babies.

“At a time when 43 million Americans hold a collective $1.5 trillion in student debt, the Trump Budget cuts $170 billion from college affordability programs. At a time when our roads, bridges, public transit, and electrical grid need major upgrading, the Trump Budget somehow cuts infrastructure spending. And at a time when we face an existential threat from climate change, the Trump Budget maintains billions in subsidies for fossil fuel corporations while slashing the EPA by over 26 percent next year.

“The Trump Budget does not see a problem in this country it cannot somehow make worse. Unless, of course, the problem is that the wealthiest families and largest corporations in this country haven’t gotten enough tax cuts, or that the military-industrial complex isn’t raking in profits that are obscene enough.

“The Trump Budget is an immoral document. It is a budget that takes our collective resources and hands them to the wealthiest families and largest corporations in this country and ignores the needs of the most vulnerable among us. It is proof that this president did not care about the ‘forgotten men and women’ he said he would help-- it appears he is too busy enriching his billionaire friends.

“It also seems that the Trump Budget is so shameful that the Senate Budget Committee is refusing to even hold a hearing with Trump’s budget director about it, the second time in this committee’s history to do so. I can only assume that the Chairman had nothing nice to say about this disastrous Trump Budget, so he’s saying nothing at all.

“As Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, I will do what I can to ensure that Trump’s Budget is rejected by Congress. This is not what our priorities as a country are about.”

Without a more like-minded Congress, Bernie is not going to be able to pass some of the most attractive parts of his agenda. That's why Blue America has a page called Bernie Congress. The candidates on the page-- which you can find by clicking the thermometer on the right-- and campaigning on the same issues Bernie is campaigning on: Medicare-for-All, a Green New Deal, College for All, Housing for All, Workplace Democracy, Fair Taxation, Jobs for All, Racial Justice, and so on. I asked Arizona congressional candidate Eva Putzova how she feels about the Trumpist budget. "Trump's budget," she told me, "can only be described as cruel and fraudulent. How else can we describe cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security? Taxpayers have been putting their own money into these programs to be there for them when needed. These are earned benefits. Trump is simply stealing from the American people."

I also asked the progressive running in Monroe County, NY, Robin Wilt. "A wise man," she said, "once said, 'Don’t tell me what your priorities are; show me your budget.' Trump’s budget represents the kind of moral depravity that has resulted in endless war, rampant and unsustainable wealth inequality, crushing student debt, a crumbling and carbon-intensive infrastructure, and a shrinking middle class. It is not so much a budget, as it is an enemies list. In its crosshairs are working families, our seniors, our students, and our most vulnerable. The beneficiaries are those who need it the least: billionaires who already enjoy too many entitlements at the government’s largesse. Bernie Sanders needs a Congress that will reflect the priorities of the American people, and budget accordingly. That’s why I am running on a platform that reflects our collective values in support of Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, Housing Justice, Educational Equity, Workplace Democracy, Fair Taxation, and Racial Justice. For too long, the needs of people have been neglected in favor of boosting corporate profits. I reject that as immoral."