Dem
51
Ties
4
GOP
45
Maybe there will be a blue wave/tsunami on November 3, and maybe not. You can't be sure, of course, until the ballots are counted. What you can be sure of, however, is that everyone thinks a blue wave/tsunami is coming. That includes the media, the pollsters, the psephologists (including us), the Democratic pooh-bahs and the Republican pooh-bahs. In the past 48 hours or so, Donald Trump has shown that he is absolutely scared witless. And part of the evidence is the two policy moves he's made, both reeking of desperation, in an effort to save the Republicans' bacon.
We'll start with the latest effort to buy the people's votes using the people's money. We doubt that very many people believe that they will be getting $5,000 checks from the government on some unspecified future date, no matter how well the Republicans do on Election Day. Certainly, after Trump made that promise at the Republican "convention," there was no bounce in the GOP's numbers—not even a dead cat bounce. In fact, since he issued forth with that promise, the Republicans' numbers have gotten almost uniformly worse.
This being the case, Trump and his people decided they needed to come up with some actual money, and to deliver it before people cast their midterm ballots. This is not such an easy problem to solve, since there aren't piles of money lying around to use for de facto bribes. Remember, once you start talking about sending a check to tens of millions of people, the price tag gets very big very fast. It's possible the Republican-controlled Congress might be persuaded to fund such a thing, but probably not and, in any case, neither chamber is in session until after the elections.
So, Trump's people (presumably Russell Vought) came up with this, which Trump announced on his boutique socialist media platform:
I am pleased to announce that my Administration will, immediately, begin sending "Checks" of nearly $100 to over 20 MILLION wonderful Seniors to help pay for their Medicare Part B premiums, which we have already reduced by significant amounts. This money will come from the Medicare Improvement Fund, a pointless "Slush Fund" that has only been used by Dumocrats in Congress to pay for the Waste, Fraud, and Abuse for their Special Interest friends, and drive up Healthcare costs. We are finally using this Fund, along with my Most Favored Nations Deals, to substantially LOWER costs for our Seniors. I pledged to protect and preserve Medicare and Social Security, which were on the verge of RUIN by Joe Biden, who foolishly and maliciously let tens of millions of Illegal Aliens into our Country, and we are doing just that for America's Seniors. This is separate from the equally substantial Refund "Checks" we are sending to One Million Americans who were overcharged for their Unaffordable Care Act plans by Joe Biden.
Because I delivered on this very important issue for the American People, they can also rest assured the highly popular $5,000 Trump Dividend will be distributed to every U.S. Citizen if, and when, the Republicans win the Midterm Elections! Thank you for your attention to this matter. President DONALD J. TRUMP
Trump's understanding of grammar is so strange. Why, for example, is 'checks' in quotes? Is that a warning that people aren't actually going to get checks, and instead will receive $90 in, say, Taco Bell vouchers? Ok, McDonald's vouchers.
Whatever is going on, let's talk about the problems we see with this idea. First, from a political perspective, we are skeptical that it will have much of an effect, even if the checks do reach people before they cast their ballots. Some sizable number of those seniors are already voting MAGA. Some additional number won't vote at all. A large chunk of the remainder are most certainly not going to sell their votes for money, particularly so paltry a sum as $90. How many people are left? That is to say, people who are going to vote, and weren't going to vote Republican, but will do so once they have four Jacksons and a Hamilton in their paws? We think that number is very, very small. And unless they are concentrated (say, in the Villages?), they're not going to swing any elections.
The second problem here is that the plan is illegal. The money is going to come from the $2.2 billion Medicare Improvement Fund, which is meant to be spent on improvements to hospitals and to insurance programs. It is not meant to be used on bribes (or, if you take the pro-Trump interpretation, it is not meant to be used on subsidies for Medicare subscribers). Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), who is very Trumpy, and who knows a thing or two about fraud related to government spending on healthcare, admitted to CNN's Jake Tapper yesterday that it's not legal. He also, without much conviction, expressed his hope that if the White House does break the law here, "Somebody will stop them." Gee, Senator, if only someone could figure out what part of the government has the power of the purse.
The third problem (though not everyone thinks this is a problem) is indicated by the snarky remark we made in the fourth paragraph of this item. It would be hard to find a clearer-cut example of socialism than taking government funds and redistributing them to poorer citizens in order to help them cover the costs of a social welfare program. We could have sworn we had heard the Republicans say socialism is bad. Like, hundreds of times. In the last week.
In any event, it certainly feels like a Hail Mary pass to us. And that brings us to the second desperation maneuver that Trump has unleashed in the last 48 hours. This one was rumored over the weekend, and finally came to pass yesterday: an executive order that, according to its own heading, is "President Donald J. Trump Promot[ing] Diesel Affordability."
The main (and really only) thing the new XO will do is make "red-dyed diesel" available for purchase to everyone. Under normal circumstances, red-dyed diesel (which really is dyed red, to make it easy for inspectors to identify abuse) is a form of farm subsidy; it's tax-free, but can only be used for vehicles (e.g., tractors, harvesters) not being used on roads. Any vehicle being used on roads has to use regular diesel, and therefore has to pay gas taxes.
Trump made a big point of signing the XO at a rally in Nebraska, with Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE) by his side. And really, the entire thing—not just the signing ceremony—is just political theater. The amount of diesel that will now be made available to regular drivers is a relative pittance as compared to the amount of diesel that is no longer being imported into the United States. Every analyst we read said this will have no noticeable impact on prices. It also occurs to us that if fuel that is supposed to be limited to farmers is suddenly available to everyone, farmers may not be able to get as much fuel as they need, at the prices they need. We're just guessing on that, but if it's true, well, many farmers are already hopping mad with the administration.
Trump has hemmed and hawed on this diesel issue, and has hinted at many and varied grandiose plans for addressing the problem, most obviously a temporary embargo on diesel exports from the U.S. If Trump actually did that, it would make Big Oil (which paid good money for him) very angry, would do long-term damage to U.S. trade relationships with other nations, and... probably wouldn't ease diesel prices in a meaningful way. We presume that the fact that Trump's "big reveal" was a limited and pretty useless maneuver is a tacit acknowledgment from him and his administration that the more aggressive approaches (like the embargo) just aren't workable. (Z)