Democrats’ Hard Left Turn Already Hurting Americans — But Liberals Want More
‘The Administration has proposed a total of about seven trillion dollars of spending in its first few months in office. That absurdly overpriced COVID package would actually be the cheapest of the three massive bills Democrats want to pass! For some perspective, about $7 trillion is considerably more money in inflation-adjusted terms than America spent fighting and winning World War II.’
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) delivered the following remarks today on the Senate floor regarding the economy:
“Democrats’ hard left turn thus far has affected the entire U.S. economy. And it’s hitting working American families where it hurts.
“In January, President Biden inherited safe and effective vaccines, a re-opening economy, and a country that was sitting on more pent-up savings than anything economists had seen in living memory.
“But Democrats had already dreamt up a massive, record-shattering Washington spending spree. Like one House Democrat admitted way back at the start of the pandemic, liberals saw the crisis as ‘a tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our vision.’ Democrats had already decided to run up the American people’s credit cards no matter what.
“Their first purchase was a $1.9 trillion excuse for a ‘COVID bill’ that Democrats rammed through on a party-line vote. Even liberal economists, even former advisors to Presidents Clinton and Obama, cautioned the Democrats’ bill was way larger than the remaining hole in our economy, badly-tailored, and might well cause inflation.
“Everyone from Republicans to liberal economists warned the Democrats’ bad bill could easily cause inflation that would hurt ordinary American families.
“Well, look where we are today. We just got the most dramatic monthly inflation report in over a decade.
“Ask any working family about gas prices, food prices, home prices, lumber prices, used car prices. One survey just found that more than 80% of American families are tightening their household budgets because of the threat of inflation.
“But the problem with the Democrats’ product wasn’t just how much printed and borrowed money it flooded into the economy. The problem was also how little of substance American families got for that money.
“Larry Summers, former President Clinton’s Treasury Secretary, has put it this way.
“Quote: ‘What’s striking about [that bill] is that all of the trillions of dollars — all of it — does not include a penny directed at ‘building back better.’
“He continued: ‘It transfers to state and local governments that don’t have any new budget problem… It’s paying people who have been unemployed more in unemployment insurance than they earned when they were working. It’s giving checks to families in the 90th percentile of income distribution.’ End quote. That is the staunch Democratic economist Larry Summers.
“The Democrats’ hard-left turn has already hurt our economy. But they still seem to think that massive bill should only be the appetizer!
“The Administration has proposed a total of about seven trillion dollars of spending in its first few months in office.
“That absurdly overpriced COVID package would actually be the cheapest of the three massive bills Democrats want to pass!
“For some perspective, about $7 trillion is considerably more money in inflation-adjusted terms than America spent fighting and winning World War II.
“The Biden Administration wants to tax, borrow, and print more money than America spent on World War II to finance a grab-bag of miscellaneous liberal programs that would further jack up prices on the things families need to buy.
“It took less money to win a global war than these Democrats want to spend on a hodge-podge of stuff like electric cars and welfare programs.
“Seven trillion dollars of mediocre socialism and liberal social engineering. No serious expert thinks this is what our economy needs.
“No wonder Larry Summers says he’s concerned that these proposals are, quote, ‘substantially excessive… way overdoing the requisite response.’
“The sooner this Administration can get the memo, the more bipartisan progress we’ll be able to make and the better off working families will be.”
Related Issues: Economy
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