The Green Lanterns

Cet article sur Trump et les Républicains est excellent. Soit dit en passant, je savais que Trump était cinglé mais pas à ce point: il ne serre même pas la main aux citoyens ordinaires parce qu’ils sont porteurs de maladies!

Trump offers the ultimate symbol of this: he won’t even shake hands with any ordinary Americans out on the stump, because « you catch all sorts of things » from them. Yes: the Republican front-runner is a billionaire who literally won’t touch the poor or middle class.

Trump probably won’t become the Republican nominee, but not because most Republicans reject his premisses. No: it will be because he states these arguments too crudely for mass public consumption. He takes the whispered dogmas of the Reagan, Bush and Tea Party years and shrieks them through a megaphone. The nominee will share similar ideas, but express them more subtly. In case you think these ideas are marginal to the party, remember – it has united behind the budget plan of Wisconsin Representative Paul Ryan. It’s simple: it halves taxes on the richest 1 percent and ends all taxes on corporate income, dividends, and inheritance. It pays for it by slashing spending on food stamps, healthcare for the poor and the elderly, and basic services. It aims to return the US to the spending levels of the 1920s – and while Ryan frames it as a response to the deficit, it would actually increase it according to the independent Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. Ryan says « the reason I got involved in public service » was because he read the writings of Ayn Rand, which describe the poor as « parasites » who must « perish », and are best summarized by the title of one of her books: ‘The Virtue of Selfishness.’