MSNBC’s Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough showed how far gone he was from being a Republican (and instead a Democrat) when he tag-teamed with former Obama official and Morning Joe analyst Steven Rattner to warn that, if Republicans get their way on government spending and debt, cars and trains could be more at risk of crashing and falling apart, food-borne illnesses could skyrocket, and taxpayers would have more room to cheat.
Rattner set the table with a skewed view of the plan. After correctly pointing out that much of what makes up the federal budget happens automatically and wasn’t annually doled out by Congress (e.g. entitlements, debt, and defense), the 11 percent was non-discretionary consisting of the various government agencies and Republicans want to “cut...47 percent of that.” In contrast, he naturally praised Biden’s plan.
Scarborough acted to this with horror, calling the Limit, Save, Grow Act “absolutely catastrophic” and implying the consequences could be deadly the next time you get in a car or board a plane or train: “What that would do, of course, it would make getting on a plane far more dangerous. It would — getting in a car with your family, going on vacations, far more dangerous. All the safe — transportation safety, getting on a train, far more dangerous.”
Not fear-mongered enough yet? Well, Scarborough also claimed the food supply could be more likely to be rotten: “It would make the food that you feed your children at night far less safe.”
Once he added in the idea tax cheating would rise, he tried to sound like a fiscal conservative: “I have [thought] since 1995 when I first got to Washington, that we’ve got a deficit problem. We’ve got a debt problem.”
But he quickly went back to his liberal ways, suggesting Washington’s spending be addressed by repealing the Trump tax cuts which, contrary to its portrayal in the liberal media, would harm the middle class.
So, reverting back to spending levels from the year of our Lord 2022 and repealing the Inflation Reduction Act would have such tragic consequences?
Rattner agreed and piled on, adding that not only would your food and modes of transportation become hazardous, America’s “transition to clean energy” would be at stake, criminals would run rampant with a weakened Justice Department, National Parks would be doomed, workers would be taken advantage of, and the water brackish (click “expand”):
Sure. Joe, you alluded to the ways in which everyday Americans would be affected by this. Imagine the agricultural Department, which inspects all your food and makes sure it is healthy to eat, imagine the Federal [sic] Drug Administration which approves your drugs and makes sure they’re safe to take, imagine the fact that our transportation system that does so much to also keep us safe, would be affected. And then, you have things that you may feel are sort of less critical, but imagine, you know, all our National Parks closed because the Interior Department doesn’t have enough money to fund them. Or Energy Department, which is working so hard now on our transition — transition to clean energy, imagine how they would operate with so much less money.
And you can just go on and on and on. Labor enforcing workplace safety standards for workers who are out there every day, the Justice Department prosecuting lots of criminals and wrongdoers every day that would have half its budget eliminated. It’s — it’s really almost impossible to imagine the EPA making sure that our environment, our drinking water, things like that are safe, almost impossible to imagine how we operate with a government that’s literally cut in half, any more than any other business can operate if, suddenly, half its workforce disappears.
With that being the left’s view (masquerading as mainstream), here was how our friends at the Daily Signal framed these scare tactics (click “expand”):
Beyond objecting to the deficit reduction package in general, leading Democrats have used misleading claims to demagogue House Republicans’ proposed reduction to annual spending levels. Republicans seek to reduce appropriated spending to fiscal year 2022 levels, which would result in Congress needing to prioritize how to spend within that lower amount.
Unfortunately, Democrats now claim that lowering the top-line amount would automatically cut veterans’ care, rail safety, and more. This is simply not how the annual spending process works, since Congress still would need to decide how funds are allocated and could channel funds toward these and other needs that the American people rightly consider top priorities. Republicans have been adamant that veterans will not face cuts in benefits, and Congress has hundreds of ways to reduce spending without damaging core federal responsibilities.
On top of this, Democrats claim that priorities such as care for veterans would face a 22% cut, but such statements are based on bad math.
Scarborough’s latest liberal meltdown and wild accusations against his former party was brought to you by advertisers such as Allstate, Liberty Mutual, and ServPro. Follow the links to see their contact information at the MRC’s Conservatives Fight Back page.
To see the relevant transcript from May 11, click “expand.”
MSNBC’s Morning Joe
May 11, 2023
6:42 a.m. EasternWILLIE GEIST: Let’s talk about what Republicans are hoping to extract from this negotiation over the debt ceiling. Major cuts to discretionary spending.
STEVE RATTNER: Sure. So, let’s just set a baseline for all of our viewers to explain discretionary spending very quickly. So, here’s our budget, $6.3 trillion. Most of it is made up of things that Congress doesn’t appropriate on a yearly basis: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, those things are all locked in. Then you have defense, which most people consider to be locked in. And so, what we’re fighting about, what Republicans are aiming at, is this little 11 percent slice of the budget. And where that becomes important is because when you start cutting the amount they want to cut, you’re only cutting from this, which means that, in order to achieve their number, they want to cut 47 percent of that. And so, that includes all these different kinds of agencies: NASA, Commerce, international, Education, Energy, Labor, Justice, State, all of them would have budgets cut by 47 percent. And that’s after inflation, so the actual cuts would be bigger. And just to put that in perspective with the President’s proposal, the President would — has a relatively modest increase of four percent in his spending. And he has some offsetting deficit reduction measures, which we’ll talk about in a second.
GEIST: So, 47 percent proposed cuts to discretionary spending from Republicans. And, as you move to the third chart, it represents a philosophical difference where Joe Biden wants to find the money by raising taxes, and Republicans want to do that by cutting spending.
RATTNER: Exactly, Willie. So, first, you have the Republican cuts that we talked about that essentially are $4.8 trillion of which virtually are — $4.5 trillion by cutting taxes. Ironically, the revenue raisers — most of the revenue raisers that they want is by taking away the IRS funding, which actually costs the government money, because we make money on the IRS because of the audits and recovering money from taxpayers. So, President Biden, as I said, wants to increase spending modestly by $2.6 billion over ten years. A trillion dollars over ten years, excuse me, it should be a “t.” But he wants to raise taxes, mostly business and wealthy Americans by $5.3 trillion over the same period. So, his deficit reduction is smaller than — than the Republicans. But, if you look at the last chart here, what you’ll see is that the Republican savings are in the early years. Biden catches up. And, by the end, Biden actually reduces the deficit by slightly more than Trump when you get out here to these out years. But, look, we shouldn’t kid ourselves, we do have a deficit problem. There is the problem. That is our growing deficit without doing something and at — both of them are trying to do something. But as you alluded to, the something is very different.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Steve, of course, if you cut 50 percent of 11 percent of the budget, those cuts would be absolutely catastrophic. What that would do, of course, it would make getting on a plane far more dangerous. It would — getting in a car with your family, going on vacations, far more dangerous. All the safe — transportation safety, getting on a train, far more dangerous. It would make the food that you feed your children at night far less safe. It would — I mean, you can go down the list, Steven, it’s just — it’s — those numbers are — are not possible. And, as far as the IRS goes, it would make the IRS even less responsive to taxpayers who are being audited or need a refund. And the IRS is already operating on 1980s technology right now, so I bring that up. I want you to, if you could, do a couple things for me. First of all, add — tell — tell Americans how else their lives would be made more difficult, more dangerous if you slashed 50 percent of that 11 percent of the budget, which is all the things that we think of as government, outside of the Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense. And — and secondly, you and I both agree, and we have agreed since the Obama administration, and I have since 1995 when I first got to Washington, that we’ve got a deficit problem. We’ve got a debt problem. If — if — in — if you and I were to sit down and tried to hammer out a deal here, how do you — how do you — how do you raise the debt ceiling and also look at the debt in the long term and — and — and — and — and try to slow down the massive increase in debt? And let me just say, let me throw the first item on the table. Let’s completely get rid of every Trump tax cut from 2017.
RATTNER: Sure.
SCARBOROUGH: And let’s go from there.
RATTNER: Sure. Joe, you alluded to the ways in which everyday Americans would be affected by this. Imagine the agricultural Department, which inspects all your food and makes sure it is healthy to eat, imagine the Federal [sic] Drug Administration which approves your drugs and makes sure they’re safe to take, imagine the fact that our transportation system that does so much to also keep us safe, would be affected. And then, you have things that you may feel are sort of less critical, but imagine, you know, all our National Parks closed because the Interior Department doesn’t have enough money to fund them. Or Energy Department, which is working so hard now on our transition — transition to clean energy, imagine how they would operate with so much less money. And you can just go on and on and on. Labor enforcing workplace safety standards for workers who are out there every day, the Justice Department prosecuting lots of criminals and wrongdoers every day that would have half its budget eliminated. It’s — it’s really almost impossible to imagine the EPA making sure that our environment, our drinking water, things like that are safe, almost impossible to imagine how we operate with a government that’s literally cut in half, any more than any other business can operate if, suddenly, half its workforce disappears.
SCARBOROUGH: Yeah.
