Medicaid, education, Planned Parenthood, and welfare are subject to huge cuts in failing red states.
While the left wing in this country points out how inept GOP heavy states are at balancing their budgets, there may be a larger monster lurking beneath the depths that we’re missing. Maybe it’s a purposeful agenda — the outcome of bankrupting a state seems to certainly play in the favor of right-wing agendas.
Yesterday, I reported on the ineptitude of the Kansas state governor, Sam Brownback and how he has governed his state into severe debt by drastically cutting income taxes. While the state lost $4 billion in revenue since 2012, it’s only projected to be in debt by about half a billion by the end of this year. The easy fix would be to reinstate the old income tax laws, but that isn’t Brownback’s plan. He plans on staying the course and eliminating income taxes altogether in his state.
His plan will cost his state BILLIONS in revenue over the next few years.
Brownback’s proposed fix is to start slashing funds for social programs that benefit low-income citizens. He plans on redistricting schools to “fix” education funding, undoubtedly shafting poorer students from getting proper funding while even the wealthier districts lose funding as well. Medicaid is also seen as a “problem area.”
And it really is a perfect GOP plan, isn’t it?
Brownback gets to take the red pen to programs the GOP has railed against for YEARS without looking like a complete monster, because he gets to shrug and say, “Well, we don’t have any money.”
Arizona is another GOP-heavy state where former Governor Jan Brewer has left the state in financial ruins — a projected one billion dollar shortfall by the end of this fiscal year — a disaster that fanatical ultra-conservative Gov. Doug Ducey is going to have to solve.
During the 2009 recession, the AZ budget shortfall was $1.6 billion, and education, medicaid and other programs were deeply cut during that time. While the former governor raised sales tax to pull AZ out of that mess, somewhat, social services took a beating. Parks were closed. School nurses laid off.
It looks like Ducey will follow in his predecessors footsteps when the time comes and once again social programs will hang in the balance. Ducey has already promised to dismantle the medicaid expansion that helped hundreds of thousands of Arizonans acquire health care.
After years of denouncing welfare, women’s services and other infrastructure programs some Republicans are making good on their threats and trying to create a tax-free utopia — for those who can afford it.
The chart below shows that Arizona and Kansas really can’t afford to keep taking from their students, yet they will, even though they are in the bottom five of student spending:
Why would people keep voting for these dunces if they’re dismantling help for those who need it most?
Well, they use issues to their advantage that every right wing ear wants to hear (READ: racism, anti-immigration, sexism, guns, bigotry, homophobia, etc.) to garner votes and pass their malignant agendas that hurt people from ALL parties. Income level also plays a part in willingness to help poorer residents.
We should know as a nation that poverty knows no party. We know that unemployment is a problem of the left and right because most Americans are one lay-off or misstep away from losing their jobs. These are not partisan issues.
Fox News would have Americans believe that it is the only the left that experience poverty and have a “mooching mentality” and that by offering no incentive to unemployed or low-income people this would help people grab themselves by the bootstraps and lift their self out of poverty — but it is the red states who require more federal aid because their own states are not willing to extend relief.
Bottom line: Stingy red states who only look out for the rich, eventually cost all Americans with their federal tax dollars.
Photo: Kindness Blog
Marching toward Republicans’ dystopian wet dream step by step.
I like the article, however, couldn’t you have come up with a more recent study about Red State Socialism? Those numbers are 10 years old.
Yes they are, but so what? Tjings have not improved in the intervening years, it’s safe to say that in light of the economic downturn of 2008.
I’m sure Mittens has the same plan for the country while his own money is hidden away tax-free.
There is nothing new here. “Starve the Beast” has been the Republican mantra for decades.
Republicans are still pissed that they had to give in and allow Social Security after the first Great Depression. They have been trying ever since to take us back to the 1800’s , when they ruled the country and profits meant everything .
How about because they’re the people who vote?
There is one sure way to take care of the problem , if the right wing is not here there is no problem the faster the right wing is gotten rid of the faster we fix the problem
of course they are, and this comes as absolutely no surprise whatsoever. the republicans are taking a page from milton friedman’s chicago school economics; privatize, deregulate, and cut social services. create a crisis, and then while people are scrambling for an explanation for what is happening (in america playing on xenophobia, fear of second amendment erosion, homophobia, racism, etc are major parts of the playbook) hit them with an economic shock. this has always worked to the benefit of multinational and national corporations, but never for everyday working people. what this system is is outright fascism, but since americans almost exclusively associate fascism with nazi germany they fail to recognize this truth. we only have to look to pinochet’s chile, suharta’s indonesia, poland in 1989/1990, south africa after the end of apartheid, and the dozens of other examples around the world to see where this road leads us. once the middle class has been destroyed, and people begin to protest in earnest we will see the same sorts of repression and state violence here as had happened there. the state will then blame their violence on the victims. it’s a shame this is happening here, but as sinclair lewis is often incorrectly cited as having said “when fascism comes to america, it will come wrapped in a flag and waving a cross.” (i have been unable to find who did say this, but assuredly someone did).
They not only are trying to do it in red states, but the nation as a whole as well.
Ya think? Yeah, that’s exactly what they want to do. The question is, is there any way to stop them? If they succeed, they misery they will cause will be a nightmare.
Seriously, you’re realizing this just now???
“Our goal is to shrink government to the size where we can drown it in a bathtub.” -Grover Norquist