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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHooray! Trump's parade goes the way of his wall.
By Jennifer Rubin
Opinion writer
August 17 at 12:00 PM
The Post reported Thursday that President Trumps grand military parade is on hold:
-snip- (three paragraphs about the cost being up to $92 million)
That prompted Trump on Friday to cancel the parade, declaring: The local politicians who run Washington, D.C. (poorly) know a windfall when they see it. When asked to give us a price for holding a great celebratory military parade, they wanted a number so ridiculously high that I canceled it. Yeah, who would have come up with such a silly money-waster?
The parade episode provides a possible strategy for dealing with Trumps illegal, wasteful, dangerous and illogical demands. (To put the parade in context, as of May, special counsel Robert S. Mueller IIIs probe had cost about $17 million.) Want a wall? Fine, but later. Want to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin? Sure, but in 2019, or 2020. How about another summit with the human rights menace Kim Jong Un? Definitely, but well have to check the calendar. (A year from Sunday, perhaps?) The capital gains cut on the super-rich? Of course but in 2020.
Then there is the presidents proposed space force, the subject of much mockery. The military doesnt seem too keen on the idea. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis originally opposed it, and according to a recent CNN poll, Americans do, too, by a 55 percent to 37 percent margin. The Pentagon cannot even say what it would cost, but it could be billions. Next time the president brings it up, perhaps his staff can tell him it will work better in 2019 you know, after Star Wars Episode IX. (Maybe the realization that Congress is never going to vote for this juvenile fantasy led Mattis to conclude that he might as well not buck the president on this one.)
Whether it was launching a trade war, separating children from their parents at the border, piling up debt, making concessions to dictators or hobbling Obamacare with no replacement, the country would have benefited had we waited indefinitely before acting on Trumps proposals. The same is true of Trumps grand plans that have yet to come to fruition. By the time 2019 or 2020 rolls around, he might have forgotten about some of them or become dismayed by the cost. He might not even be in office. And, most critically, one or more houses of Congress might be in Democratic hands. Then, like his loopy plans for a parade and the wall, his space force will amount to no more than a punchline.
And by the way, the next time Republicans want to cut the National Endowment for the Arts or Meals on Wheels or the budgets for foreign aid, national parks and the National Institutes of Health, Democrats might want to remind them that all of those things are a heck of a lot more valuable and popular than Trumps cockamamie ideas for wasting taxpayers money.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/opinions/wp/2018/08/17/hooray-trumps-parade-goes-the-way-of-his-wall
Cha
(297,797 posts)FO Fraud
DemoTex
(25,405 posts)Trump: the Failure President.
('Course, the damnfool will spin it as a HUGE win)
Marie Marie
(9,999 posts)Sugar Smack
(18,748 posts)Claritie Pixie
(2,199 posts)Id be willing to bet he was told no.
Totally Tunsie
(10,885 posts)It's so typical of him that he cannot admit to any setback or defeat, and always finds a way to spin the story to his advantage.
It's also stupid of him because he doesn't realize that he's as transparent as can be, and any thinking person doesn't fall for his phony claims.
LOSER!
smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)He was living for that parade and he certainly would not have cancelled it because of the expense. He has to make it look like it was his idea because if he didn't it would make him look weak and not in control (even though he is both of those things).
I am just glad it was cancelled. It was a stupid idea that would have wasted millions of taxpayer dollars just to pay tribute to the ego of a pathetic little man who was a 5-time draft dodger and who has no respect for the brave men and women who have served in the past and are serving now.
Gothmog
(145,666 posts)question everything
(47,544 posts)but now he no longer likes him..
And we know how Whiny Donny reacts to people he no longer likes