The Art of the Con

Yesterday we got to read about how the number of Republican senators holding out on the Trump reverse Robin Hood tax cut bill began to drop precipitously. Evidently, they all either were convinced that the Donald was going to address their needs or they were too afraid to hold out any longer. I would offer a third possibility: they really never gave a rat's patootie about whatever it was that had inspired them initially to oppose the tax bill.

John McCain: back when he gave his famous thumbs down on Trumpcare, he claimed that he was deeply concerned about the welfare of the institution of the Senate and the lack of open debate in a participatory, deliberative and bipartisan process around the bill's passage. Now? Not so much.

Susan Collins: she claimed to be concerned about the forecast 13 million who will likely lose health care coverage as a result of the tax bill destroying the individual mandate. Now? She believes, actually believes, that this issue will be addressed later by Trump in some still to be determined process at some still to be identified time.

Bob Corker: a self-proclaimed budget hawk who would not support the tax cut bill if it so much as added one penny to the deficit. Now, thanks to some fuzzy, still-to-be-specified trigger mechanism, he believes that Trump and the GOP will agree to raise taxes should the voodoo economic forecasts of rapid economic growth not generate sufficient tax revenue.

Ron Johnson: the gentleman from cheesehead state has insisted that the the tax bill do better by small businesses. He received the same vague promises of being made right and then folded like a card table and got in line with the rest of the GOP.

The point is that none of these folks ever really seriously considered opposing this tax bill, which is the Republican Holy of Holies, a massive regressive redistribution of income and wealth to the most privileged, entitled and well-off. The American electorate finally gifted them with the harmonic convergence to advance their real agenda of unbridled greed and corruption - total control of two of the three branches of government with the third quickly falling in line with a slew of hard-right nominations to the federal bench.

It's all a con, and we'll all be left holding a losing hand.