Are you paranoid? They're really out to get you, after all.
I can recall over 20 years ago, as soon as it was clear the Reagan promise to balance the budget was the most squalid bullshit ever used to dupe the voters, political commentators concluding that the real stealth objective was to mire the nation so deeply in debt that there simply wouldn't be any money available for social programs. I mean none. Only defense and the other basic "libertarian"-approved services. People need to be reminded, and to keep in mind, that virtually all of the enormous national debt we're struggling to pay off today and for the next 10-15 years (well, the Democrats are, anyway) was run up on Reagan's watch, including the mass economic "murder" of the savings and loan scandal, in which the most qualified ripoff artists absconded with the life savings of hundreds of thousands of families, hid their own obscene profits offshore, and then lept back in to buy up the assets of the ruined s&l's for pennies on the dollar.
Republicans and such like are always blathering on and on about how other people should live, work, and save "responsibly", but they never talk about the consequences of the Republican deregulation of the 80s on the hardworking, straight living, frugal folks who did just that and were left destitute by the likes of Charles Keating, the erstwhile anti-porn "crusader". They hope no one will bring up the fact that the enormous giveback they've just engineered will mean that much more time to pay off the debt and that much more interest to be paid -- I'd say by "all of us", but by the time the piper must be paid, you can bet they'll be whistling a different tune. Watch out for those flat & sour notes!
Paranoid? We better be!
