Trump's budget speech: Today's news for February 28th

Tonight, President Trump will be speaking before a joint session of Congress. Here is what to expect:

Washington Post:

Trump to propose 10 percent spike in defense spending, major cuts to other agencies

President Trump will propose a federal budget that would significantly increase defense-related spending by $54 billion while cutting other federal agencies by the same amount, an administration official said.

The proposal represents a major increase in federal spending related to national security, while other priorities, especially foreign aid, would face massive reductions.

According to the White House, the defense budget would increase by 10 percent. Trump also will request $30 billion in supplementary military spending for fiscal 2017, an administration official said. 

But without providing specifics, the administration said that most other discretionary spending programs would be cut to pay for it. Officials singled out foreign aid, one of the smallest parts of the federal budget, saying it would face “large reductions” in spending.

...The White House did not specify how Trump’s budget would address mandatory spending or taxes, promising that those details would come later. The vast majority of federal spending comes from programs Trump can’t touch with his budget. Social Security costs totaled about $910 billion last year, and Medicare outpaced defense spending with a total cost of $588 billion. Medicaid, interest payments on debt and miscellaneous costs made up an additional $1.2 trillion.

In other words, Trump's budget is moving deck chairs on the federal government's Titanic. Ask yourself one question: Why does a country that spends more on national defense than any country in the world need to spend more?

Further:

New York Times:

Trump and Paul Ryan Head for a Clash Over the Budget, and Ideology

President Trump’s proposal to slash domestic spending in order to preserve the two biggest drains on the federal government — Social Security and Medicare — has set up a battle to determine who now controls the Republican Party’s ideology.

...Mr. Trump’s budget blueprint — which is expected to be central to his address to Congress on Tuesday night — sets up a striking clash with the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan, who has made a career out of pressing difficult truths on federal spending. For years, Mr. Ryan has maintained that to tame the budget deficit without tax increases and prevent draconian cuts to federal programs, Congress must be willing to change, and cut, the programs that spend the most money — Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

But Mr. Trump, in a dogged effort to fulfill his campaign promises, has turned that logic on its head in the budget outline he is expected to present to Congress this week. That blueprint would make good on his promise to increase spending on the military and law enforcement by $100 billion over the next 18 months. And it would extract all of the savings he can from the one part of the budget already most squeezed, domestic discretionary spending, potentially decimating programs in education, poverty alleviation, science and health.

When you look at this closely, this is an argument between welfare for competing special interests, and not even all of us. The elderly get the biggest cut of the budget pie. Of course, Trump makes sure the military-industrial complex gets a bigger share of the pie too.

The great irony here is that Democrats find themselves allied with Trump (and the RINOs) in defending Social Security and Medicare spending.

"Politics makes strange bedfellows."--Charles Dudley Warner

In the end, expect the budget to increase so that everyone gets what they want.

Mr. American Taxpayer: BOHICA.