It's political doublespeak, meant to appeal to people's preferences.
If you take 100 random Trumpers, and ask them the below, you'd likely get yes for each one. but you can obviously see how they contradict each other. so you end up keeping everything the same, and re-allocating funds from one small thing to another.
"Do you want smaller government?"
"Do you want our military to be strong?"
"Do you want to take care of our veterans?"
"Do you want seniors to have their social security and medicare?"
Trump said he won't touch medicare or medicaid. Said he wants to increase military spending and not touch social security. That accounts for around 70% of the budget.
How do you make the massive changes he thinks DOGE needs to make out of the last 30% of the budget?
We're going to have to come up creative ways to get there like means testing for social security. If you're hell bent on "rich people paying their fair share." then how about we means test those rich folks and roll THEIR Social Security benefits down to people who actually need it?
> then how about we means test those rich folks and roll THEIR Social Security benefits down to people who actually need it?
Best way to get otherwise reasonable people to stop supporting social nets. Making a welfare system designed to support only the least well-off is the first step to removing it.
>Best way to get otherwise reasonable people to stop supporting social nets. Making a welfare system designed to support only the least well-off is the first step to removing it.
Isn't that what it already does? I live in a very rich very blue state and even here the qualification criteria for just about any state program more or less exclude any poor household that's trying to get ahead (single mom with a full time job, two employed parents multiple kids or elderly dependents, etc). I know the adjacent less rich less blue states are even worse.
The myth is that social security is a retirement program, not a welfare program. The fear is that if you start means testing it, is no longer an entitlement, and people will perceive it as a welfare program instead of a retirement program, and that will be the beginning of the end.
> Trump said he won't touch medicare or medicaid. Said he wants to increase military spending and not touch social security.
Whenever you see a definitive-sounding Trump quote, take a moment to see if he's also said the exact opposite before you make any conclusions. Here's a good overview of this particular topic: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/donald-trump-m.... He's said he definitely won't cut entitlements, but also that he might, and he tried to make cuts when he was in office but didn't try that hard.
If you're trying to predict what he's going to do you can look at past actions, or what personnel he has put in place. Just reading what he says is useless.
>If you're trying to predict what he's going to do you can look at past actions, or what personnel he has put in place. Just reading what he says is useless.
I'd just like to reflect on how absolutely batshit crazy America is to have voted this guy into the most powerful political position in the world, again!
The whole thing is actually very impressive. Nobody actually knows what he stands for, other than he claims he's the best at it. Even after he did none of it when he was in the same position before!
If you take 100 random Trumpers, and ask them the below, you'd likely get yes for each one. but you can obviously see how they contradict each other. so you end up keeping everything the same, and re-allocating funds from one small thing to another.
"Do you want smaller government?" "Do you want our military to be strong?" "Do you want to take care of our veterans?" "Do you want seniors to have their social security and medicare?"