2020 is an election year in the most contentious political environment this great country has seen since 1968. President Donald Trump will continue to campaign on immigration reform, bringing the power back to the people, and his desire to avoid any foreign conflict. Democratic candidates seem to have turned their side into the “Free Primary,” seemingly giving away everything in the store with campaign promises that would be either almost impossible to pass in some cases or possibly explode the national debt even deeper into the trillions.
The two most glaring examples of empty Democrat presidential contender promises are Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. Medicare for All is projected anywhere from $13.8 trillion to $36 trillion depending on which plan certain groups/candidates have proposed. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) proffered a way to get the $20.5 trillion of new federal spending that would be needed to cover the plan. In it, everybody would no longer have to pay any premiums and co-pays. However, even money meant to benefit families would be subject to taxation. Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT) has put forth a plan that would include a four percent (4%) tax hike on employees in order to get to his magic number. Basically, any Democrat asking you to get in the “Medicare for All” line to balance its budgetary effect would drastically cut military spending, higher income taxes for wealthy, and now famous “wealth tax” that Senator Warren would like for you to calculate.
While it seems Democrats can find some way to pay for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal is a different story, providing impractical solutions to problems. The total transition of an entire nation’s economy that would be required to make the Green New Deal true in the proposed timeframe (net zero emissions by the next decade or so) is basically impossible. This can be shown as finding the cost of the Green New Deal is almost impossible to nail down. The Congressional Western Caucus, a mostly Republican group, set the cost at $98 trillion in its first ten years. However, this includes Medicare for All in it totaling $32 trillion in its first ten years; for the sake of argument, let’s say $64 trillion in ten years to implement without Medicare for All. Democrats’ response to the issue is to say is that not doing anything would ultimately be worse than the cost.
Democrats would also be in a bad position politically to support these issues without losing crucial battleground states and seats in Congress. States like Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin would probably not elect a Medicare for All and/or Green New Deal supporting senator in the current political environment. They would have to rely on traditionally “blue states” like California, New York, and Illinois to bring progressives, and well as a hope of former “red states” like Texas and Georgia going from the complete right-wing to the complete left-wing.
Republicans have problems as well. Republicans who were tooting the horn about budget deficits since the age of Newt Gingrich as Speaker of the House have lost their way. The talk of the GOP today has gone to constant supporting of bigger spending hikes like border wall spending or infrastructure. Both sides support infrastructure, but maybe we could cover more ground if we eliminate some pointless government spending, lest we start piling on trillions and trillions of additional dollars to the national debt.
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