Elon musk being like "all that money we're spending on vets could be going into my pockets."
Do it. Cut tricare too. I don’t want those things gone, but holy hell yes please eliminate the willingness of the military to aid you against the constitution. Defund barrack improvements and force married troops to bring their spouses into the barracks while you’re at it.
Crash and burn and let us rebuild America with an understanding it wasn’t immigrants or trans people that did this, it was rich people and fascists.
This will piss off every single veteran, active service member, and their relatives. I don't just want this shit to fail, I want people to remember just how little fucks these people give about anyone other than themselves.
Republicans have been cutting vet benefits for years, and it hasn’t stopped them from voting red yet.
I want to see these fucks do this then ask for the military to keep them in office when they violate the constitution
If you hear back well they did not realize... you answer with yes, this is how little they care
Optics of cutting the programs aside, it's criminal that beneficial programs like these don't get re-authorized.
Shameless, veterans risk their lives for their country, the least the govt can do is give them healthcare
Unfortunately for veterans, they aren't risking their lives for their country. They're risking their lives for the special interests of corporate oligarchs who couldn't care less about them.
I know but that’s a hard sell for poor young recruits, if they knew this more they’d charge like mercenaries
This is amazing. Good. Fuck the troops. Let's see you garrison your military bases in every other country in the world, losers. You can't even meet recruiting goals now!
FWIW, this breaks from the Two Santas Strategy. This Santa is suppose to be funding things conservatives want, while at the same time reducing taxes (on the rich), thereby driving the deficit up without making their voters mad. If you actually cut funding for a bunch of stuff people rely on, you will earn the ire of the voters, that's why no one ever does it.
Yeah, there will be a core of people who will defend Trump and Musk to their self-inflicted death, but those people are in the minority. Most Americans (and most people in the world) voted against the incumbent this year because they were unfortunately there during a time of inevitable inflation. And they'll do it again if their lives continue to get materially worse over the next few years.
I can't help but wonder how we would be sitting right now if Trump had won in 2020. But we're due for a generational crisis, and I don't think that wouldn't have been nearly as exciting.
Remember when if you didn't "support our troops," Republicans would ask you why you hated America?
The right wing has never supported veterans
The good old days when it was republicans who were "if you're not with us I will enjoy watching you die"
At best, "support our troops" was a version of that dumbass magical thinking that, in earlier times, held that the U.S. lost in Vietnam because Americans didn't clap for Tinkerbell, err, I mean, support the war. Mostly, it was a thought-terminating cliché.
Yeah, as you rightly point out, it was never about the soldiers themselves.
I learned the ugly truth of that way back in 1990 when I was still in Middle School and Bush Sr. sent Americans to die for oil in Iraq and all of his fans in my town were tying yellow ribbons around the trees in their yard to "support the troops" being sent to die pointlessly.
"Lost in Vietnam"? Oh, no, they were saying much worse than that. It used to be that if you suggested the US lost Vietnam that you were "insulting the bravery of the troops" or some shit like that. It was only after the War on Terror became unpopular that you could say the US lost Vietnam (because, you know, it did) without some jackass wingnut bringing out the faux patriotism.
They confirmed, for anyone paying attention, that that was always performative bullshit.
“This bloated liberal socialist program is inefficient and doesn’t work. Because it’s liberal and socialist. So we’re going to get rid of it. We’re planing to plan a replacement plan, but we haven’t planned on when to plan it. But we’ll blame the libs for that too, even though we have essentially captured all branches of the government at this point.”
They’ve learned their lesson from 4 years of failure to repeal and replace Obamacare. “Replacing was hard and expensive and anything that addresses people’s concerns or doesn’t ensure failure to re-elect was to the left of this, so we’ve decided to just repeal and not replace. Get over it loser.”
And people will eat it the fuck up like the hogs they are
Part of me, as an outsider looking in with abject horror, wants to see this happen just because I still hold out hope that it might finally wake up a not-insignificant part of rural and rust-belt America that live off these benefits (or ‘handouts’ according to the GOP) out of their political stupor.
But on the other hand, I know that once it’s gone, it’s very unlikely to be brought back in the immediate future by the current crop of Dems, who seemingly would rather keep dangling it as a carrot (along with restoring ablation access) in order to entice voter turnout.
Just know that there are people in the US that feel the same. And it's horrifying.
No exceptionalism for war criminals. Get in line like the rest.
Save billions on essentials while spending trillions in bullshit.
they just want Russia to be the top superpower
Okay I'm ootl on this asshat but now I keep hearing his name. Who the fuck is he and what the fuck is his problem?
So during the Republican primaries there were several people trying to demonstrate themselves as similar but different to trump. Desantis was trump but able to force his policies through. Haley was trump but not as anti woman. Ramaswamy was trump but younger and possibly less sane somehow.
He’s a venture capitalist from and focused on fucking Columbus Ohio (and no he is not known or liked there, it’s a weirdly blue city)
Conservative to both questions
Given the rest of trump's cabinet about 50/50 shot at being someone who assaults children.
Not for millenia would I have realized that Department of Government Efficiency stood for DoGE. What a funny little boy Elon is.
As a US citizen, paying for veterans healthcare and early education programs advance my interests a whole fucking lot more than paying this jackass.
Stupid piece of shit, you don't speak for us.
As someone with just as much federal authority as the non-existent DOGE, I also propose defunding expenditures that “don’t advance the interests of American citizens.”
And I would like to start with fucking Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon fucking Musk.
I am terrified at them defunding the VA. I've had a much easier time getting good medical care from VA doctors than I ever did going private and I'd be bankrupt without the VA. It's because of the VA that I have any savings at all
Agreed. They must have gotten better in the last decade too, because I don't see the horrible things that people have said about the VA. Yes there are long wait times for appointments, but that's happening in private care now as well.
Okay I agree with the other comments here but I'm a bit confused on this.
How are we still spending money on these things if congress doesn't approve it? The legislature sets the budget, did they just forget to make it official and extend these? Also why even have a phase out period in the first place?
I think it's because there is a difference between the Budget and Appropriations in Congress. The budget is a plan, where programs are authorized and an overall budget is set. The appropriations process is what assigns particular dollars to particular discretionary programs. (Certain programs deemed "mandatory" by Congress, like Social Security, Medicare, and interest on the debt, get allocated money automatically and are not involved in appropriations)
If I had to guess, I would say that once a program is authorized once under a budget, it can continue as long as it (or the Federal department it is part of) is not specifically de-authorized, and as long as it continues to receive appropriations specifically for that program.
So, it is likely that this is all about Ramaswamy's total ignorance of how Congress works. Which tracks pretty well with what this DOGE is all about.
So, it is likely that this is all about Ramaswamy's total ignorance of how Congress works. Which tracks pretty well with what this DOGE is all about
How Congress worked.
It still works that way, until the rules change. Republicans have the votes to change how Congress works, if they act in unison. But they will have just a slim a margin as last time, and they had trouble electing a Speaker. Even in the next Congress, they needed a secret vote to elect the Senate Majority Leader because they didn't want any receipts on who voted for whom to make it back to Dear Leader.
It is possible that the Republican Party turns into a oroboros of spite, eating itself from within because of perceived grievances. That might be the best possible outcome we can hope for.
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