Republicans, for as long as I can remember, have made tax cuts their number one priority; applied, without exception, so as to help Capital more than Labor and grow the deficit. In a perverse way, this is consistent with their belief that government "is the problem; not the solution" ; so as little of it as possible is a good thing from their point of view. What better way to rid themselves of government then to starve it. They pay lip service to budget deficits, i.e., the "National 'Debt'"; yet never miss an opportunity to up defense spending. They "privatize," or push for privatizing, those things it makes no sense to privatize, such as passport issuance, social security, and prisons. They complain about spending 50 cents a year on the Arts and ~1% of the budget on foreign aid -- much of which comes back to the U.S. defense industry. And despite their love affair with tax cuts, the purchase of 1700 F-35s, way more than can ever possibly be used, they enthusiastically supported. At least this is consistent with their insouciance toward the State Department, whose job is to prevent the need for F-35s. This is the Party that Newt Gingrich, after something like a 40 year Republican drought, led irretrievably, it now seems, down the road to total dysfunction. With their embracement of cult politics and Q-Anon the Party is racing like wild lemmings toward a cliff. If there is a better example than today's Republican Party of Soros's admonition that "if you believe government is bad, you will create bad government," I don't know what it is! It's up to the Democrats now to hold off the Republican wrecking ball; guided by the redoubtable Moscow Mitch and headed toward the Democrats and our government. Here is a related excerpt from today's Bloomberg: for the complete article please see Bloomberg.com Size Doesn’t Matter to Republicans on Deficit Budget balance plays no role in determining GOP policy preferences, and hasn’t for decades. By Jonathan Bernstein March 25, 2021, 6:30 AM CDT Gap year. Photographer: Pete Marovich/Bloomberg ... Can we finally get rid of the false claim that Republicans only care about deficits when a Democratic president is in office? Republican politicians, with few exceptions, care about federal budget deficits never. Not when Donald Trump was president, not when Joe Biden is president. Not when George W. Bush or Barack Obama were president. Never — or at least not since the current Republican mainstream emerged about 40 years ago, and became essentially unanimous about 30 years ago. The truth is that the standard Republican position is to reject budgeting altogether, if budgeting involves trying to hit a deficit target. What Republicans want is to spend at levels they think appropriate (more on defense and some domestic programs, less on others) and to tax at levels they think appropriate (generally less, especially for the wealthy). They are consistent in those preferences. They don’t care — at all — about how the revenues the government receives from those taxes compares to overall government spending. Republican preferences don’t add up, which is why deficits leap up every time they get to control policy. [Read the rest of the article at Bloomberg.com]