In criminal law, intent is when a person proposes and anticipates certain consequences they foresee will happen if their series of acts or omissions continue, and desire it to happen, and generally informs a bad human being, or a criminal. Most Americans would like to believe their politicians are not criminals, or would not intentionally commit acts they know harm the people or government, and yet Republicans have made it clear for the past two years they have every intention of damaging the economy and the people they are elected to serve. As the dreaded sequester cuts and the certain damage to the economy, jobs, and most Americans loom large, Republicans have revealed that the harm their sequester cuts were intended to cause is part of their plan that defines them as criminals, enemies of the state and the American people.
Despite the devastation the Republican cuts will wreak on the economy and the people, another Republican joined leading Congressional Republicans in categorically stating the GOP intends on allowing the cuts to occur and are reveling in the prospects of another recession and increased poverty. Republican Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) said, “Let me be very clear, these spending cuts are going to go through on March 1st ….The Republican Party is not in any way going to trade spending cuts for a tax increase. When you take a look at the total dollars there are better ways to do this, but the cuts are going to occur.” Barrasso echoed Ayn Rand devotee and failed vice-presidential candidate Paul Ryan who said, “House Republicans twice passed legislation replacing the sequester with smarter cuts,” that include denying 600,000 poor children food stamps and Medicaid coverage, end food assistance for 1.8 million adults including Meals on Wheels, and healthcare for disabled Americans. In Republican parlance, smarter means more damage to Americans; particularly those Ryan considers “takers” that his running mate Willard Romney enumerated at 47% of the population who want “free stuff.”
Thus far, Republicans have not offered any proposals to offset the sequester cuts, and have rejected two different proposals from Democrats that achieve greater deficit reduction, create jobs, and contain revenue that Republicans reject on principle, and their message to the President, and the people, is that they have no intention of stopping the sequester damage. The GOP’s backdoor austerity program has been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to impede growth, destroy a million jobs, and send the economy into a recession, and it is their sole intention to see it come to pass. It is tempting to cite aversion to revenue that is their raison d’être in government, and it plays a role, but it is their aversion to the American people, especially those in need, that drives their Draconian intent to increase poverty and cull the takers from the population with slow-death starvation, untreated infirmities, and job-killing austerity.
Republicans claim their adherence to cutting programs affecting 98% of the population is due to out-of-control spending, but spending is already at historically low levels, and if the sequester goes into effect, food safety, education, law enforcement, safety net programs, and economic growth will be, and already has been, dramatically impacted which is the GOP’s intent. They have also laid the groundwork to blame their economic malfeasance on the President, and not their wont to create hardship on the population. In fact, Republicans’ only plan to avoid the sequester cuts is voiding the defense cuts and replacing them with more domestic cuts including those already in the sequester.
According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, allowing the automatic sequester cuts, regardless how they are apportioned, will subtract 0.6 % from gross domestic product growth and eliminate a minimum 750,000 jobs in 2013 alone. Conversely, eliminating the sequester, Budget Control Act cuts, in conjunction with the fiscal cliff’s tax increase on the extremely wealthy will boost real GDP by about 2¼% by the end of 2013. Still, Republicans are resolute to allow the sequester and impose deeper cuts the CBO did not include in the dire warning of defunding the economy in a deliberate, pre-meditated assault on America and the people. In fact, their abhorrence of new revenue to reduce the falling deficit, and stimulate the economy, informs more than just their wont to protect the richest 1% of income earners, it informs their hatred of the people.
America’s infrastructure is crumbling, people need jobs and a raise in the minimum wage, education funding is deplorable, and more Americans are living in poverty as a result of the GOP’s inaction. Republicans know spending creates jobs, boosts the economy, and yet their strategy is allowing sequester cuts to decimate the economy and the people instead of even considering new revenue. They are culling the population with cuts that affect Ryan’s “takers” and Romney’s 47%, and when they have starved children, seniors, Veterans, and killed off disabled Americans, they will replace them with the middle class their policies are decimating to protect the rich.
Intentionally taking the life out of the economy and the people is not to prevent President Obama from winning a second term, it is solely to create economic distress and it is not just because they abhor revenue; they abhor America. Their refusal to invest in jobs, the decrepit infrastructure, or lift a finger to continue economic recovery puts them in league with America’s enemies because their actions are intentional, they know the consequence, and desire it to happen. With the damage Republicans intend imposing on the economy with job-killing sequester cuts, and the severe austerity calculated to decimate the American people, Republicans are not saying “so be it,” they are saying “bring it on.”
Born in the South, raised in the Mid-West and California for a well-rounded view of America; it doesn't look good.
Former minister, lifelong musician, Mahayana Zen-Buddhist.
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