I’m going to push back hard against this meme.
It is a myth that Trump and the Republican Congress have been rewarded with control over two branches of the federal government (three until the 2018 midterms), but chose to advance no policies while in office. In fact, they have used their power in Washington to push a number of policies.
It’s just not the policies their base wanted.
1.) The Tax Cuts – The single greatest accomplishment of Blompf and the Republican Congress was the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in which budget reconciliation was used to push it through the Republican Senate with 51 votes. The centerpiece of this bill was a reduction in the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21% which was a bonanza for the wealthy and Corporate America.
Sen. Chuck Schumer: “After nearly three years of leadership under a Republican President, Senate Republicans’ only significant legislative accomplishment is a hugely unpopular and unsuccessful tax bill that favors the very wealthy.” pic.twitter.com/SsCVSNBvq7
— The Hill (@thehill) August 2, 2019
2.) Health Care Reform – The Republican effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act failed in the Senate by only one vote when John McCain torpedoed the bill. This was the top priority of Blompf and the Republican Congress in 2017 and a serious legislative effort was made to do it through the budget reconciliation process. Virtually all of 2017 was spent advancing the Ryan agenda on health care and tax cuts and the plan was to continue to push the Ryan agenda in 2018 with entitlement reform, but that had to be shelved because in December 2017 the Republicans sabotaged Roy Moore’s Senate campaign in Alabama and lost a reliable seat. Health care reform had failed even with “Big Luther” Strange in the Senate and with only 52 votes in the Senate that was the end of doing anything controversial in Congress.
3.) Banking Deregulation – In spite of the loss of Luther Strange’s Senate seat to Doug Jones, Blompf and the GOP scored another major victory for the donor class when they worked with their puppets on the Democratic side of the aisle to deregulate banks in May 2018.
4.) Gorsuch – Blompf nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court to replace Antonin Scalia who had died during the 2016 campaign. Mitch McConnell and the Republican Senate got it done.
5.) Kavanaugh – Blompf nominated Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court and the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings dominated last summer. Mitch McConnell and the Republican Senate also got that done. Blompf and McConnell have been very successful in reshaping the federal judiciary with lifetime conservative appointments particularly in the lower federal courts.
6.) Criminal Justice Reform – The lame duck session of the 115th Congress was the last chance for the GOP to fund the border wall after repeatedly kicking the can down the road. Instead of getting that done or acting on any of the many immigration bills that died a quiet death in McConnell’s Senate, they used their last gasp of power to pass criminal justice reform for the Koch Brothers.
7.) Military Budgets – Blompf and the Republican Congress have had no problem pushing through blockbuster military budgets. Military spending has increased from $618 billion under Obama in FY 2017 to $700 billion in FY 2018 under Trump to $719 billion in FY 2019 and most recently to $738 billion in FY 2020 and $740.5 billion in 2021.
8.) Paris Climate Accord – Blompf had no problem pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord in June 2017 which was a major change in environmental policy from the Obama administration.
9.) Iran Nuclear Deal – Blompf unilaterally pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal in May 2018 and has dramatically escalated tensions with Iran. This is also a major change in foreign policy from the Obama administration which negotiated the nuclear deal with Iran that had eased tensions.
10.) Iran Sanctions – Blompf has designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organization. He has piled wave after wave of sanctions on Iran. In a total reversal of our foreign policy under Obama, Blompf has taken us to the brink of war with Iran and is currently deploying troops to Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the region.
11.) Russia Sanctions – In spite of running in 2016 on easing tensions with Russia, Blompf and the GOP have done the opposite in power. The U.S. has formally withdrawn from the I.N.F. Treaty, piled wave after wave of new sanctions on Russia, armed Ukraine with Javelin anti-tank missiles which Obama refused to do and expanded NATO to include Montenegro.
12.) Saudi Arms Deal – Is Blompf incapable of exercising any power as president? Not when it comes to Saudi Arabia. He recently vetoed several bills passed by Congress which would have blocked his massive arms deal with Saudi Arabia and its allies.
13.) The Muslim Ban – This was a big deal on the campaign trail which differentiated Blompf from his rivals and established his bona fides as a populist outsider who was “moving the Overton Window.” In the end, the Travel Ban ended up banning travelers from a laundry list of the State Department’s enemies: Iran, Venezuela, North Korea, Syria, Libya and Somalia.
14.) Jerusalem – Moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem for Sheldon Adelson is currently one of Blompf’s greatest foreign policy accomplishments.
15.) Presidential Pardons – Blompf has used his power as president to pardon Sholom Rubashkin, a Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic Jew, who was sentenced to 27 years in prison for exploiting illegal aliens in his kosher slaughterhouse in Iowa. Just the other day, he commuted the sentence of Ronen Nahmani, an Orthodox Israeli drug dealer who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for distributing synthetic marijuana. He has also handed out pardons for Scooter Libby, an establishment crony from the W. administration, and most bizarrely, the long dead early 20th century black boxer Jack Johnson who was convicted of transporting a White woman across state lines to service him as a prostitute.
16.) Golan Heights – Blompf recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights in order to help Bibi Netanyahu win reelection. In return, Netanyahu named an Israeli settlement there in Blompf’s honor.
17.) Yemen – Blompf pulled out his pen to veto a bill that would have ended U.S. support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen.
18.) Foreign Aid To Israel – As you might expect, Blompf and the GOP worked together to raise foreign to Israel by $200 million.
19.) Foreign Aid To Palestinians – As you might expect, Blompf has cut all foreign aid to the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
20.) Anti-BDS Legislation – After all the noise of the 2018 midterms, Blompf and the GOP quickly pivoted to passing anti-BDS legislation which was AIPAC’s top legislative priority. It was overwhelmingly passed by both the House and the Senate. So far, the GOP has spent all of 2019 focusing on accusing the Democrats of anti-Semitism.
21.) Venezuela – Blompf’s foreign policy has been trying to foment regime change in Iran, Syria and Venezuela by all means short of sending in troops with a U.S. invasion. He supported Marco Rubio’s failed effort to topple the government of Venezuela earlier this year.
22.) H-2B Visas – In spite of Blompf’s theatrics on the campaign trail about immigration, his administration is granting the highest numbers of H-2B visas since the W. presidency.
23.) H-1B Visas – In spite of the saber rattling about Big Tech, 140 House Republicans recently voted to end the country caps on H-1B visas in the Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act.
24.) H-2A Visas – What about Big Ag?
Is Big Ag getting left out at the trough? The GOP is delivering on cheap labor for Big Tech and the hotel and restaurant industry. As of a few weeks ago, the Blompf administration is changing the rules to make it easier for Big Ag to bring in more of its foreign peons to undercut the ones already here.
25.) Rise Above Movement – When Charlottesville stopped arresting White Nationalists, the Blompf DOJ had no problem bringing charges against the Rise Above Movement and seeking even further hate crime charges. Three of them will be in prison for the next 2 to 3 years.
26.) James Fields, Jr.
GOOD! #LockHimUp https://t.co/JyoBt7vGhr
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) June 28, 2019
BOOM!
James Fields, Jr. got two life sentences and an extra 419 years in prison in federal and state court over Charlottesville. To put this in perspective, El Chapo only got one life sentence plus 30 years in prison.
27.) White Nationalism
I’m sure you have heard that “Mensch Extraordinaire” Blompf is “moving the Overton Window” and making White Nationalism more acceptable. Actually, the GOP stripped Rep. Steve King of his committee assignments as punishment for his milquetoast defense of Western civilization. It also unanimously condemned White Nationalism (Steve King included) while exempting Antifa of any blame for the violence in Charlottesville. Blompf signed it. The Democratic House later condemned White Nationalism again over the Steve King row in January and Republicans once again unanimously supported the resolution.
28.) USMCA – Do you remember on the campaign trail when Blompf denounced NAFTA as the worst trade deal in history? Do you remember when he vowed to kill the Trans-Pacific Partnership? Blompf was true to his word when he killed TPP. He later copied and pasted two-thirds of the text which was the basis of USMCA which he signed in Buenos Aires last November.
29.) Net Neutrality
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is so based!
He killed Net Neutrality for the cable companies. He later ruled out taking any form of action over social media censorship.
30.) Julian Assange
Oh … that’s right. I almost forgot. Mike Pompeo got that done too.
31.) Globohomo
Last but not least, the Blompf administration is currently waging two global crusades to promote feminism in foreign countries and to decriminalize homosexuality. It recently scored a major victory with the decriminalization of homosexuality in Botswana.
It’s true that Blompf is shifting the Overton Window and changing the culture. In the two and a half years that Blompf has been president, homosexuality has been mainstreamed on the Right while White Nationalism has been systematically deplatformed on the internet and effectively criminalized in the streets while immigration enforcement on the Mexican border has all but collapsed.
Are you tired of winning?
Imagine for a moment what Blompf will do for his supporters when he no longer has to worry about being reelected in 2021. He won’t even have to push our buttons and pretend to be a nationalist with his race-baiting tweets after the 2020 election is over next November.
I could continue to list all the great policy victories of the Blompf administration, but the above is sufficient to see the pattern. Blompf and the GOP Congress used power to reward wealthy donors, particularly Orthodox Jews, while doing virtually nothing that their White populist base wanted. Ask yourself why Blompf and the GOP chose to use power to pass or enact this unpopular agenda.
Is this what the crowds at the Blompf rallies who are trusting the plan wanted? Of course not. These desperate and gullible low-information voters were baited with one agenda by a professional con artist on the campaign trail in 2016 and 2018. As always, the GOP switched and quietly delivered on its real agenda while in office. The problem isn’t that these people lack the power to pass a populist agenda. It is that conservatives don’t even want to pass that agenda because they work for their donors.