Trump: Backstabber in Chief

US conservatives' guy goes full 'Deep State'...

SENATOR John McCain spoke for millions last week, writes Bill Bonner in his Diary of a Rogue Economist.

"I'm a pretty intelligent guy," he said, speaking of President Trump's sudden lurch to the left side of the aisle, "but I don't understand this."

On the surface, the political events of this month are baffling. Underneath, they follow an ineluctable logic.

This past Wednesday, the administration, like a mischievous boy putting a mouse in the girls' bathroom, threw the issue of the "Dreamers" – the 800,000 illegal immigrant children granted permission to stay in the country by President Obama – to Congress.

Shrieks could be heard from coast to coast. What was the meaning of this?

What would Congress do about it?

Nobody quite knew. But one thing was certain: It would get in the way of everything on the legislative docket.

This seemed, again on the surface, to be the last thing the Trump Team needed. The White House needs a win.

After more than 200 days in control of the White House and Congress, and nothing to show for it, the administration is starting to look like a loser.

No O'care repeal and replace at home. No end to losing wars overseas. The money still flows, unimpeded, to the zombies and the cronies. The swamp grows.

Behind the Sturm und Drang of hysterical press reports, it is business as usual – which is exactly what was coming all along.
 
Key to draining the swamp – the last spade left that fiscal conservatives might use to dig a ditch – was the debt limit.

For 100 years, the "debt ceiling" imposed a requirement on Congress to confront the implications of its own spendthrift ways. The bigger the deficits, the more it needed to raise the debt ceiling.

Not that there was ever any doubt about what Congress would do. It's raised the ceiling 90 times already. It wasn't about to stop now.

Still, the requirement forces the politicians to fess up to what they are doing...and sometimes make compromises.

In particular, House conservatives were hoping to use the coming debate to focus attention on what they see as runaway spending, boondoggles, and excess debt.

So you can imagine their disappointment when it came out last Wednesday that the president had stabbed them in the back.

Yes, dear reader, it was appalling. Donald Trump has now gone Full Deep State.

First, he stabbed the "America First" foreign policy crowd in the back. There will be no cutback in the military's disastrous romp through the Middle East.

He stuck a knife in the backs of those who looked to him to rein in runaway entitlements spending, too. Not a single cent has been cut from Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid.

And those hoping to get the big banks and Wall Street out of their pockets and off their backs also got shanked. Trump filled his administration with Goldman alums.

Now, the president has pulled out a shiv and gone to work on Speaker Paul Ryan and his remaining conservative supporters.

In addition to colluding with liberal Democrats to continue the spending spree with no discussion or amendment, Mr. Trump has made a devil's deal with the deepest of Deep State Dems on Capitol Hill, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, to crash the whole debt ceiling limit.

At nearly $20 trillion, we have plenty of debt already, in our opinion.

Scheduled to rise by about $1 trillion a year over the next 10 years...it's growing five times faster than the economy that supports it – you'd think that would be enough.

And now the president and his new Democrat allies are planning to take away the last tool budget conservatives have left: their right to approve fed borrowing. Reports The Washington Post:

"President Trump and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have agreed to pursue a deal that would permanently remove the requirement that Congress repeatedly raise the debt ceiling, three people familiar with the decision said.

"Trump and Schumer discussed the idea Wednesday during an Oval Office meeting. The two, along with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, agreed to work together over the next several months to try to finalize a plan, which would need to be approved by Congress.

"One of the people familiar described it as a 'gentlemen's agreement'."

Frankly, we're shocked. We didn't think it was possible to do a "gentleman's agreement" between Trump, Schumer, and Pelosi.

Where were the gentlemen?

As for "The Donald", all we can say for sure is that he's got one helluva collection of knives.