How much is that gonna cost?

Note how much the cuts and war(s) cost in 2009/10

Senator Jon Kyl (John?) recently suggested that the Feds should extend the Bush tax cuts permanently, but also rejected any notion that unemployment benefits should be extended unless the money was cut from somewhere else.

The awesome part about this is that it articulates the Republican position very clearly. Rich people should make more money, and unemployed people should go get a job. And if they can't feed their kids / pay the mortgage while they look for work, tough shit. What, the tax cuts will cost about TWENTY TIMES as much as the cost of unemployment? Whatever. Give a (very much smaller) portion of the people 20x as much money as a (very much larger) portion of the people in great need. Yeah that sounds fair.

Almost as fair as creating a budget shortfall and then sticking your opponent with the bill. I'm no fan of unions, and at first I thought it perfectly reasonable for the governor of WI to reduce his operating costs. Except that he didn't spread the costs evenly; he exempted (predominantly white, Republican) firefighters and cops, and stuck it to the teachers and other public sector employees. Is this a legitimate attempt to balance the budget, or is it a concerted effort to break the union? I'm not suggesting the unions in Wisconsin don't need to be reined in, or that costs don't need to come down. I'm suggesting that there are more intelligent ways to go about it than, you know, giving the people that voted against you the middle finger. Oh, you're being funded by the Kochtopus? Never mind then. They totally have your best interest at heart.

Aside: This is an old pattern from Reagan-era politics- cut taxes so overall funding is reduced, and then make up the deficit difference by cutting social spending, because you can't cut defense spending or how will we pay for an enormous standing army? Nuclear bombs or school lunch programs? Never mind that you can buy a shitload of lunches for bomb money. THE COUNTRY IS AT RISK.