GOPer feeding frenzy

When Republicans won the trifecta (House, Senate and White House) in November 2016, I expected that they would enact a standard GOPer program: "cut taxes for the very rich and make the poor and middle classes pay for the giveaway ..." I also opined that "rampant corruption will be the order of the day. The new President is a classic con man ... and so are his cohorts. They will steal all they can while in power."

What I did not entirely expect was that legislative Republicans would so completely model their policy disinterest and self-interested ethical pliancy on the Great Leader down at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

The tax bill Republicans have muscled through Congress is quite simply theft from the people of this country, designed to pay off rich GOP donors and enrich legislators themselves. It's come to that. Elections this fall in New Jersey, Virginia and even Alabama show that majorities are onto the rip off. The pigs may be about to lose their place at the trough so they are seizing their chance.

Take it from better-placed observers than I:

Republicans are behaving as if they see what everyone else sees coming. They’re just hightailing it with the cash instead of trying to avert it.

Brian Beutler, Crooked Media

Tax cuts are the driving force of elite Republican politics. The lack of a bill was demoralizing the donor class, driving down contributions. 2018 looks bad but with literally no major legislative accomplishments to show, maybe it gets even worse. So you need to pass something. Where do you get the votes? Sell them. Every man and woman for himself. Everybody take a few appliances out of the store before we burn it down. That’s the story of this bill. It doesn’t even add up in conservative policy terms. It’s really just a heist. Organized looting.

Joshua Marshall, TPM

Or take it from a Republican who once knew better, but now has gone in on the plunder.

If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed.......and we will deserve it.

— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) May 3, 2016

H/t to Matt Yglesias for the Graham tweet.