It’s been two months today since we had a change in administration nationally. The stated goal of this new administration is to remove everything instituted by both previous administrations of the other political party, and to destroy, decimate, and/or privatize many government institutions like the Department of Education, Department of Defense, CDC, USAID, VOA, Department of Labor, FAA, the VA health system, and so many more.
While the majority of the country (including those who did not vote for the current president, those who did not vote at all in the past election, and some who did vote for him but may believe he’s not delivering as promised) have been left reeling by these daily blows to the status quo, a minority is cheering on the rapid and extreme cuts and blows.
By passing the new administration’s budget on Feb. 25, they want to continue $4.5 trillion in tax cuts to billionaires over the next decade, but only if spending is cut $1.7 trillion. It was decided that those cuts will come from us (the regular folk) and the institutions that serve us.
Eliminating the entire federal workforce will only come up with about $336 billion a year toward that $4.5 trillion “gift” to billionaires. But that’s firing EVERYONE.
Next on the chopping block, many experts say although the administration denies it (like they denied so many other things they did the next day), will be Social Security ($1.35 trillion/year), Medicare, and Medicaid. Perhaps not entirely, but the cuts will be severe. This is our common ground!
Whether you’re a 20- or 30-something, already deep into your retirement, or (like me) right on the cusp of retirement, this affects you. Regardless of your party affiliation, or how you voted. This will take food out of your mouth, may make it so you can’t pay your rent or mortgage, and will determine whether you can enjoy your final years in an assisted living or nursing facility if needed. It very well may determine whether there are such facilities at all soon.
There will be no exceptions for those who voted for the ruling party. All of us will be hit equally hard – except the billionaires, of course.
Naturally, there is a much easier and more fruitful way to raise the $450 billion needed each year to give billionaires that extra tax break that they don’t need (and some don’t want). By cutting corporate welfare – the free money handed out to corporations just for doing what they’re doing anyway – the government could find $181 billion/year in savings immediately. Such companies are raking in billions in profits each year, with each year better than the last, and yet they are still asking for and receiving federal handouts.
Hundreds of our friends and neighbors have tried to inform the people elected to represent us in government of their displeasure with much of what is being done to our government. I’m told that one representative no longer answers the phone line, and the other’s voicemail is full. So dozens of our friends and neighbors have taken to a time-honored and very American means of communication: in-person protest. And these friends and neighbors are being called paid agitators and non–constituents brought in to cause trouble. But these are people you know who are rightly concerned about their Social Security, veterans being fired from jobs, veteran services at the VA being severely cut or eliminated, federal scientists being sacked as no longer needed – even as several pandemics lurk in the not-so–distant future, refugee neighbors who may be rounded up and deported in spite of being here legally, all of our private information (social security numbers, banking information, tax information, health information, work history) is now in the hands of 20-year-olds with a history of leaking information, and the list goes on.
One by one, many protections we’ve earned and fought for have been removed: consumer protections, financial protections, environmental protections, labor protections, transportation safety protections. As a result, we can be fired for being a woman, pregnant, gay, or non-white – with little or no recourse. If we’re screwed over by predatory lending or other shady financial deals, no one will help. If you exercise your first–amendment right to peacefully protest, you are now subject to arrest and “being disappeared” by unidentified armed thugs. As several diseases threaten another pandemic, you’re not allowed to hear about it (and neither is your doctor).
We can’t wait for the courts to catch up and protect us. The judicial system that should stand as a check and balance on both the legislative and executive branch is unconstitutionally being turned into a rubber stamp for the current administration.
Taking our Social Security and Medicare while calling us “parasites” for collecting what we paid into all our lives is not acceptable. Our elected representatives need to hear that from each of us, their constituents. There are so many other issues on which they should know your views as well, not the least of which is the policy shift of turning against all our allies while pandering to with our biggest and most dangerous enemy. We know how tariffs work, even if the executive in charge does not: we consumers will pay more and more and more; it is a punishment on consumers, not on governments. Developing invasion and take-over plans for other sovereign countries (Panama, Greenland, Canada) is a Russian ploy, not the American way.
Tell your representatives how you feel on these and any other issues near and dear to your heart. To them it’s all numbers on a page; but it’s your livelihood, and your future! If you choose to take your message to them in-person, with protest signs, go for it. The time is now, before everything is wrecked beyond being able to save it.
Contacts:
U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar
(202) 224-3244
U.S. Senator Tina Smith
(202) 224-5641
U.S. Rep. Michelle Fischbach
(202) 225-2165
U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer
(202) 225-2331
U.S. Capitol Switchboard
(202) 224-3121