Donald Trump Flew All The Way To Missouri To Talk About Taxes, And Boy Are His Lies Tired. A Livestream!

His dogs are whistling, too.

Donald Trump flew out to Springfield, Missouri, today so he could tell us all about his terrific tax proposal, which isn't so much an actual plan as it is a general set of principles for cutting taxes on businesses and the wealthy, pretending he's cutting taxes for the middle class, and creating so much prosperity that we'll all be rich, just as long as we start out rich.

Greg Sargent at the Washington Post outlined the real agenda here:

[What] we will actually hear at this speech is the death rattle of whatever pretensions to genuine economic populism Trump has ever harbored, if any. Trump will make it official that this rhetoric is merely a disguise for the same old trickle-down economics we have heard for decades — confirming that his economic agenda is in sync with the very same GOP economic orthodoxy that he so effectively used as a foil to get elected.

Yessiree, it's Trickle-Down Vista, or maybe iTrickle-Down 10, the same old Reaganite tax cuts for the already prosperous, wrapped up in a slightly new package of economic nationalism that really is nothing but some "America First" glitter on top of the stuff that hasn't ever created economic expansion, because when you give the rich more money, they invest it in the markets, not in creating jobs. And while CEOs surely appreciate having more money, there are only so many luxury cars and yachts the poor dears can buy, after all.

Trump wasn't expected to include any details of "his" plan today; instead, he'll leave it up to Republicans in Congress, just like he did with "his" healthcare plan, only there may be more Republican agreement on cutting taxes than there was on slashing Medicaid. White House officials who previewed the speech for the Wall Street Journal promised Trump would wrap up the usual help for the top tenth of the One Percent in happy blather for working-class rubes, not that they put it that way:

One of the officials said Mr. Trump would make a “very bipartisan speech” that would reflect Americans’ frustration that a well-connected few are reaping economic gains.

“We’re going to end the rigged system,” said the official, echoing language used by groups backed by billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch and contending that Americans understand how they would benefit if businesses prosper. “We’re going to build a tax code that really allows all Americans to have access to the American dream.”

Like healthcare, it's all about "access" -- just like every other tax cut for the rich has been, in other words. And the Trump-humpers will lap it up, because Trump will make it sound like they'll finally be free of oppressive stuff like the estate tax that they'll never, ever, be rich enough to have to pay. The system will be even more rigged in favor of the wealthy than it ever was, but the nice maybe-billionaire who cares about average Americans is pushing it, so they'll feel great about it. Especially if they think the blacks are getting the shaft.

Here's your livestream, if you're a glutton for punishment:

Also, since there's no indication Trump will announce any details today, it seems unlikely he'll go with Paul Ryan's completely bullshit "do your taxes on a postcard" nonsense, but he might! Either way, Vox has an excellent 'splainer on Ryan's "postcard" wet dream, with the also-excellent headline, "Paul Ryan’s postcard tax return is really dumb." Go read that!

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[ WaPo / WSJ (if paywalled, see if the Twitter linky helps) / Vox ]