Reply #7: They were ... its Grover Norquist's strategy. [View All]

[JoePhilly]

For years, Grover has been against all social programs of any kind. But he concluded that the American people would never vote to get rid of them because they work.

So his plan, adopted and extended by the GOP over the last 30 years has been to increase the deficit as much as they can any time they are in power. Not just through the existing social programs which they can't easily kill, but by subsidies to their corporate bosses, and large tax cuts to reduce revenues. They see recessions as helpful because people lose their jobs, and the tax base shrinks, government revenues shrink, and the deficit grows.

Then when they are in the minority, they scream about the deficit and demand that the Dems spend absolutely nothing. As the deficit grows, the GOP begins to claim that it is the social programs that create the deficit and argue that the only way to "save" the country is to end the social programs.

Basically, the drive up the deficit as a mechanism to claim we can't afford any social programs. And then if they get back in power, they start cutting social programs more and more ... but they also keep cutting taxes. Keeping the deficit high. They'll continue this until the kill all social programs. Or until we stop them.