@snood,
snood wrote:
Six Month Update for Trump Supporters:
So how many presidents delivered on all of their campaign promises in the first 6 months of their first term?
1. He told you he’d repeal Obamacare and replace it with something “beautiful.” You bought it. But he didn’t repeal and he didn’t replace. (Just as well: His plan would have knocked at least 22 million off health insurance, including many of you.)
It's not over yet and the gutless Get Along Gang of Establishment Republicans (including those masquerading as mavericks) in Congress have had something to do with the current failed "attempts."
2. He told you he’d cut your taxes. You bought it. But tax “reform” is stalled. And if it ever moves, the only ones whose taxes will be cut are the wealthy.
Stalled? Perhaps, if anyone really imagined it would come in the first 6 months of his presidency. Eventually there will be some "reform," although I've given up all hope that it will be the full gut job of the system that is required. If the only people who get tax cuts are the wealthy, that is likely to include me and I will be pleased. The government needs to cut spending regardless of how much tax revenue it takes in. Revenue feeds expansion and ever more involvement in people's lives. That's not good.
3. He told you he’d invest $1 billion in our nation’ crumbling infrastructure. You bought it. But his infrastructure plan, which was really a giveaway to rich investors, is also stalled.
No I didn't, and to the extent that it ever gets done with a majority or totality of tax dollars, it will need the support of Democrats and they're not willing to cooperate with Trump on anything...even a program tailor made to their interests.
4. He said he’d clean the Washington swamp. You bought it. But he’s brought into his administration more billionaires, CEOs, and Wall Street moguls than in any administration in history, to make laws that will enrich their businesses, along with former lobbyists, lawyers and consultants who are crafting new policies for the same industries they recently worked for.
No I didn't. I had some ephemeral hope that he would and perhaps under different circumstances he might have (although I think that's unlikely). My greatest regret over the 2016 election is that at a time when the American people were, I believe, ready for and desirous of actually draining the swamp, the only champion of reform on the stage was Trump (and possibly an old socialist windbag from Vermont).
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5. He said he’d use his business experience to whip the White House into shape. You bought it. But he created the most chaotic, dysfunctional, back-stabbing White House in modern history, in which no one is in charge.
Never even considered it in my decision to vote for him and I don't agree with the characterization of the current WH or that it is materially different from prior Administrations. It usually takes a year for the "White House" to gel and stabilize; for rivals to either win or lose.
6. He said he’d close “special interest loopholes that have been so good for Wall Street investors but unfair to American workers.“ You bought it. But he picked a Wall Street financier Stephen Schwarzman to run his strategic and policy forum, who compares closing those loopholes to Hitler’s invasion of Poland.
An argument can be made that it takes a thief to catch one. Our most effective cyber warriors are former hackers who got caught. Trump likes money and respects men and women who make a lot of it (generally speaking, so do I) but he himself is not a Wall Street Guy, and while he may be the thieving crook his foes claim he is, he's not a Wall Street thieving crook; not a Gordon Gecko
7. He told you he’d “bring down drug prices” by making deals with drug companies. You bought it. But now the White House says that promise is “inoperative.”
Again, not a consideration. Don't know details on this inoperative thing.
8. He said that on Day One he’d label China a “currency manipulator.” You bought it. But then he met with China’s president and declared "China is not a currency manipulator.”
Big deal. Not a consideration.
9. He said he wouldn’t bomb Syria. You bought it. But then he bombed Syria.
Don't recall that specific "promise" but if he did make it, then the fact that he changed his mind and hit them for use of chemical weapons is not only fine with me, I think it was a good thing. I doubt Reich will find many Trump Supporters having buyer's remorse over this. For those who might have liked him saying he wouldn't bomb Syria, I'm quite sure it was in the context of him promising not to get involved militarily in Syria the way we got involved in Iraq and Libya. Hitting an airport with tomahawks doesn't constitute nation building, foreign adventurism or getting mired anywhere. Last time I checked, no US military personnel rode on top of those missiles and it was American troop involvement overseas that concerned isolationists for Trump. I doubt too many peaceniks who are categorically opposed to any US military action voted for Trump
10. He called Barack Obama “the vacationer-in-Chief” and accused him of playing more rounds of golf than Tiger Woods. He promised to never be the kind of president who took cushy vacations on the taxpayer’s dime, not when there was so much important work to be done. You bought it. But in his first 6 months he has spent more taxpayer money on vacations than Obama did in the first 3 years of his presidency. Not to mention all the money taxpayers are spending protecting his family, including his two sons who travel all over the world on Trump business.
Not really a consideration, although I did appreciate his promise to take only a $1.00 salary. Does Reich know if that was a bogus promise? Is the tax dollars spent on Trump's vacations primarily for security and Air Force One operations or is he somehow billing the government for the costs associated with staying in the resorts and residences he owns in NY, NJ and FL? Is Melania travelling to Spain and Africa on the taxpayer's dime? I know that her First Lady staff is, in number, about 1/3rd of what Michelle's was. As for the cost of protecting the president's children, is Reich really begrudging them protection? Does he think it was OK to protect the children of all other sitting presidents, but not the Trump kids?
11. He said he’d force companies to keep jobs in America. You believed him. But despite their promises, Carrier, Ford, GM, and the rest are shipping jobs to Mexico and China.
No, he said that companies who shipped jobs to foreign countries would pay a price imposed by the government. Does Reich know a) That no action has been taken in this regard? or b) That any plan to take action has been scrapped as inoperative?
12. He said he’d create coal jobs. You believe him. He hasn’t. But here’s what he has done: Since 1965 a federal program called the Appalachian Regional Commission has spent $23 billion helping communities in coal states fund job retraining, reclaim land, and provide desperately needed social services. A.R.C. helped cut poverty rates almost in half, double the percentage of high-school graduates, and reduce infant mortality by two-thirds. Trump’s first proposed budget eliminates A.R.C
New jobs have been created since he became president. Since I'm sure Reich was more than happy to credit Clinton and Obama with the creation of new jobs that appeared in the economy when they were president, I don't know why he would change the rules for Trump? Do you?
-Robert Reich
Reich doesn't like Trump. OK, neither did millions of other people who wouldn't vote for him in November. If Reich wants to try and point out all of the promises Trump made on the campaign trail but has failed to make good on within
the first 6 months of his first term, who is going to stop him? It's pretty ridiculous though especially when half of the promises are things Reich never wants Trump to make good on. What is even more ridiculous is Reich's fixation (shared by millions of those Americans who didn't vote for Trump) on trying to convince those who did vote for Trump that they were gullible rubes, and (apparently) should now join The Resistance.
We get it Big Bob, you don't like Trump and you probably don't feel very warm towards those of us who voted for him, but who did you write this screed for? It couldn't have been intended for Trump Supporters unless you are foolish enough to think any of them read your tripe, or if they do, will be persuaded that you are an objective observer here.
He wrote it for all of his fellow Democrats who believe that Trump voters were gullible rubes or worse, nod their heads in agreement, snicker over how stupid the fools were and cut and paste the tripe into forums like this one.
In the final analysis
a whole lot of people voted for Trump because he wasn't Hillary Clinton. We were told by a lot of other people that even Trump would make a better president than Clinton. We saw what eight years of Obama did to America and we listened to a lot of Democrats (including Obama) tell us that with Clinton in the White House we could expect four to eight years more of the same. We saw the evidence of her arrogance and corruption...
and we bought it.
