The Playground Bully In Chief has decided to cut funding for construction projects in Blue states as retaliation for his federal shutdown. I think it’s time they remind him of who really pays America’s bills.
Right now, we’re in the first full week of a shutdown of the Federal Government because the House, the Senate and the Playground Bully In Chief, otherwise known as President Donald Trump, can’t come to a meeting of the minds on a Federal Budget.
Now depending on whom you talk to, this is because Democrats want to provide health insurance to undocumented immigrants or Republicans want to take health care funding away from folks who need the subsidies to keep from having to pay $400 a shot for their insulin.
(I’ve had to do that. It’s not pretty.)
But no matter what the reason, federal workers aren’t being paid, programs aren’t being administered, and funding that was allocated for certain projects is being withheld.
But withheld is different from terminated, and that is what this column is going to touch on. Right now, the Trump Administration, like any other group playground bullies, is threatening to retaliate against so-called Blue states because he can’t get the Democrats in Congress to come around to his way of thinking when it comes to cutting off people’s health care subsidies.
I’ve talked a lot in this column about the part that Philadelphia plays in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s finances and why it kinda angers me when the Commonwealth treats the city like a poor relation when it’s actually the ATM.
Well, the relationship between the United States and some of its more populous states — for example, California, New York, Illinois, Massachusetts and New Jersey — is kind of similar. While all of these states pay a boatload of federal taxes, they may get a $1 for every $1,000 they pay.
Which is why how many of these states are treated when they come to the feds for help is, well, trifling. For example, California, who probably pays more in federal taxes than several Red states combined, practically had to beg for money from Congress when the wildfires happened.
So, seeing the articles about Trump threatening to cut off the people who actually contribute to the nation’s tax coffers because folks won’t bend the knee to him made me think about something I often think about when it comes to Pennsylvania and its relationship with Philadelphia.
Well, The Ohio State University makes a lot of money during football season. So does the University of Texas. Most of the Southeastern Conference (SEC) is headquartered in Red States.
How about making it so America has to live off of that while California, New Jersey, Maryland, New York and other so-called Blue states keep their money and do what they need to for their states?
Could you imagine how quickly California and Washington State could solve their affordable housing problems by just keeping their money? New Jersey could cut property taxes so far down that everybody could afford to fix up their homes. New York could have enough money to go back to rent control.
It would be awesome…for the folks in those states.
For the people who would have to make due on the equivalent of the Pennsylvania Farm Show for, well, everything, not so much.
The only difference between the City of Philadelphia and the State of California is that California Gov. Gavin Newsome is at least thinking about it.
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