Trump's budget: political cannibalism

[Rightguide]

It is cannibalism in the sense that the burden falls largely on Trump's own base of white working class rural voters.

Bullshit.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Prove that statement.

Appalachian Regional Commission:

ARC projects

All of ARC's activities must advance at least one of the five strategic investment goals articulated in its 2016–2020 strategic plan adopted in November 2015:

creating economic opportunities,
developing a ready workforce,
investing in critical infrastructure, including the Appalachian Development Highway System,
leveraging natural and cultural assets,
and bolstering leadership and community capacity.

The bulk of ARC funds, which come from a federal appropriation, support grant making across a broad range of categories. All grants require performance measures. A regional research and evaluation program helps inform the agency's work. ARC emphasizes the leveraging of private-sector investments, relies on a broad network of public and private partnerships, and focuses on innovative, regional strategies to help communities help themselves. ARC targets its resources to the areas of greatest need, with at least half of its grants going to projects that benefit economically distressed areas and counties.

ARC's FY 2016 appropriation included $50 million in funding through the Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization (POWER) Initiative. This multi-agency initiative, launched in 2015, targets federal resources to help diversify economies in communities and regions that have been affected by job losses in coal mining, coal power plant operations, and coal-related supply chain industries due to the changing economics of America's energy production.

How ARC works

As mandated by Congress, ARC helps coordinate federal, state, and local initiatives to spur economic development in Appalachia.

Each year Congress appropriates funds, which ARC allocates among its member states. The Appalachian governors submit to ARC their state spending plans for the year, which include lists of projects they recommend for funding. The spending plans are reviewed and approved at a meeting of all the governors and the federal co-chair.

The next step is approval of individual projects by the ARC federal co-chair. After the states submit project applications to ARC, each project is reviewed by ARC program analysts. The process is completed when the federal co-chair reviews a project and formally approves it.

ARC is designed as a federal-state partnership that employs a flexible "bottom up" approach, enabling local communities to tailor support to their individual needs. ARC relies on local regional planning agencies (local development districts) to develop effective strategies for local economic development. ARC has made investments in such essentials of comprehensive economic development as a safe and efficient highway system; education, job-training, and health care programs; water and sewer systems; and entrepreneurial and capital market development.

Accomplishments

Since its creation, ARC has helped cut the number of high-poverty counties in Appalachia from 295 in 1960 to 91 today, reduce the infant mortality rate by two-thirds, and double the percentage of high school graduates. Over the past five years, ARC programs have helped create or retain over 101,000 jobs in Appalachia through projects that include entrepreneurship, education and training, health care, telecommunications, business development, and basic infrastructure. Grants during that period have leveraged almost $2.7 billion in private investments.[1]

 

[KingOrfeo]

Bullshit.

Yes, the burden does fall largely on Trump's own base of white working class rural voters.

 

[Rightguide]

Yes, the burden does fall largely on Trump's own base of white working class rural voters.

The burden falls on non-essential government employees.

 

[Adre]

If he had any balls he'd do something about entitlements. But he doesn't, so the NEA gets whacked for nearly zero overall effect.

 

[KingOrfeo]

The burden falls on non-essential government employees.

They ain't non-essential, they provide valuable services to rural white working class Americans.

 

[Rightguide]

They ain't non-essential, they provide valuable services to rural white working class Americans.

During the last shutdown, the government left home 17% of its employees saying they were "non-essential employees." All important functions of government were kept running.

 

[KingOrfeo]

During the last shutdown, the government left home 17% of its employees saying they were "non-essential employees." All important functions of government were kept running.

And what reason do you have to think this budget cuts that 17%?

 

[Rightguide]

And what reason do you have to think this budget cuts that 17%?

I don't, but it is justification for cutting the federal workforce. Personally, I'd cut more than that. There's a rule of thumb in private business, if you lay somebody off, production will increase by at least 10%.

 

[KingOrfeo]

I don't, but it is justification for cutting the federal workforce. Personally, I'd cut more than that. There's a rule of thumb in private business, if you lay somebody off, production will increase by at least 10%.

Government is not a private business. Its functions and purposes are entirely different, and what works in business will not necessarily work in government.

 

[Rightguide]

Government is not a private business. Its functions and purposes are entirely different, and what works in business will not necessarily work in government.

Government is not the employer of last resort like the Democrats like to think it is.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Government is not the employer of last resort like the Democrats like to think it is.

Neither is it some kind of useless parasitic growth on the private sector like the Republicans like to think it is.

 

[JohnnySavage]

I live in hard-core Trump country. Most of the residents are on some form of government assistance, but they don't see it that way. They love them some Trump and sincerely believe that he is going to make millionaires out of all of them. The prevailing opinion is that welfare for the inner cities is bad, but welfare for the hardworking hillbillies is Making America Great Again!

 

[KingOrfeo]

I live in hard-core Trump country. Most of the residents are on some form of government assistance, but they don't see it that way.

"Get your government hands on my Medicare!"

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Yes, the burden does fall largely on Trump's own base of white working class rural voters.

Okay. For the sake of argument, let us say that it is true.

Then why the hell is your team screaming the loudest about it?

Why are they acting as if all of these cuts are aimed at their constituency and Government institutions that they feel should not evr get cut, but get that automatic spending increase every year?

 

[Rightguide]

Neither is it some kind of useless parasitic growth on the private sector like the Republicans like to think it is.

Oh but it is. Other obvious cuts ought to be made in the EEOC and the Dep't of Education office of civil rights. They should be added to the list at the bottom of this page outlining Trump's present cuts:

https://cei.org/blog/white-house-should-expand-budget-cuts-additional-agencies

 

[KingOrfeo]

Oh but it is.

Cite? Preferably from a mainstream post-Keynesian economist, not an Austrian School crackpot.

Other obvious cuts ought to be made in the EEOC and the Dep't of Education office of civil rights.

Why? What they do is important and needs doing.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I live in hard-core Trump country. Most of the residents are on some form of government assistance, but they don't see it that way. They love them some Trump and sincerely believe that he is going to make millionaires out of all of them. The prevailing opinion is that welfare for the inner cities is bad, but welfare for the hardworking hillbillies is Making America Great Again!

Why are so many of them on assistance?

It's not because Progressive policies chased away their jobs.

It's because the Federally-spmsored Progressive Educational machine keeps soaking up their most precious and important resource:

http://www.thirdway.org/report/why-demography-does-not-equal-destiny

 

[KingOrfeo]

Mick Mulvaney puts his foot in it.

Mick Mulvaney, President Donald Trump’s director of the Office of Management and Budget said Thursday that the impending cuts to Meals on Wheels were “probably one of the most compassionate things we can do.” Mulvaney tried to justify his statement by arguing that the administration is “trying to focus on both the recipients of the money and the folks who give us the money in the first place. And I think it’s fairly compassionate to go to them and say, ‘Look, we’re not gonna ask you for your hard-earned money, anymore, single mother of two in Detroit . . . unless we can guarantee to you that that money is actually being used in a proper function.'”

The outrage was swift.

“Who in the hell zeroes out Meals on Wheels?” wrote Charles P. Pierce of Esquire. “Who decides that a program that spends $3 million to help volunteers feed the elderly and infirm in their communities is something that the country can no longer afford? Who are the men in the meetings who make this kind of call? What are their names? Trot them out so the country knows who they are. C’mon, David Brooks, find out who they are and explain why National Greatness Conservatism has a problem with starving elderly shut-ins.”

Jordan Weissmann of Slate was even more scathing, writing that “honestly, I would have more respect for the man if he’d stood up on stage with a stock pot and said the administration had decided that the poor should be boiled into bone broth. At least then he’d have the courage of his convictions.”

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

What's $3 million in a nation of over 300 million?


I'll lay you dollars to donuts that the various churches and charities do far more than government.

 

[Adre]

Easy to say when your belly's full.

 

[Rightguide]

Cite? Preferably from a mainstream post-Keynesian economist, not an Austrian School crackpot.

Read the article and fuck your demands for looney cites.

Why? What they do is important and needs doing.

Not unless you're fond of totalitarianism. There's no constitutional authority for a lot of what they do.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Read the article and fuck your demands for looney cites.

The article is a Competitive Enterprise Institute report. Zero credibility. You might as well cite Breitbart.

Not unless you're fond of totalitarianism. There's no constitutional authority for a lot of what they do.

The courts think there is, and there is nothing totalitarian about policing employment discrimination.

 

[Rightguide]

The article is a Competitive Enterprise Institute report. Zero credibility. You might as well cite Breitbart.



The courts think there is, and there is nothing totalitarian about policing employment discrimination.

The courts are corrupt and ideologically driven, like the one in Hawaii.

 

[KingOrfeo]

The courts are corrupt and ideologically driven, like the one in Hawaii.

They're not corrupt unless judges are taking bribes; and judges have been appointed by both Republican and Democratic presidents/governors/governments.