Trump's domestic policies reveal uncomfortable truths about the right

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President Trump is no stranger to hypocrisy, alpha male posturing, and callous indifference to those he perceives as inferior to him. His domestic policy framework, as reflected in his draconian federal budget proposals and in his egregious health care legislation, exemplifies those traits. At the same time, those ultraconservative policies are revealing in an instructive way as they shed light on the parsimonious practices that have long steered the Republican right.

In terms of hypocrisy, the substance of Trump's domestic policy, though unsurprising to close observers of the presidential campaign, flies in the face of his self-professed concern for the working class. These are the individuals and families that would be most dramatically adversely impacted by the American Health Care Act (AHCA) and by Trump's proposed array of cuts to anti-poverty programs. Beyond the horrid policy implications of these measures, the politics provides a strong opportunity for Democrats to expose Trump and his GOP allies for who they really are: the robber barons who genuine working class champion Bruce Springsteen railed against in "Death to My Hometown."

Further, with regards to the ideological underpinnings of these policies, it should be clear by now what the ultimate aim of the Ayn Rand-inspired, Paul Ryan-driven agenda is -- one wholly adopted and embraced by the Trump administration in the form of White House Office and Management and Budget (OMB) Director Mick Mulvaney. Recently, Mulvaney condemned individuals with diabetes as people whose "bad choices" ought not to entitle them to the "care" of society.

Putting aside the breathtaking ignorance of Mulvaney's armchair diagnosis of millions, these remarks are unusually candid as they lay bare an unspoken tenant of right-wing dogma. Mulvaney's assessment reflects the deeper strain in the conservative ideological mindset that Social Darwinism, the notion of survival of the fittest, ought to steer public policymaking.

Indeed, the logical extension of the right-wing campaign to promote ostensibly individualistic ideals in domestic policy is that ideally meager public benefits only belong to highly deserving citizens, if anyone at all, at the exclusion of those who suffer supposedly 'self-inflicted' misfortune. Mulvaney uttered the unvarnished truth of the right's guiding belief system, a philosophy billed with appealing language (i.e. "personal responsibility") but grounded in suspicion towards the disadvantaged.

Ultimately, if nothing else, the shamefulness of these policies is that it does not have to be this way. Several years ago, Chris Hayes made a compelling point on his nightly broadcast that struck me with its simple yet clear message that "poverty is a policy choice." The empirical evidence plainly demonstrates that to be the case. There exists, within the right's school of thought, a determination to blame sky-high income inequality on workers.

Yet productivity has not kept up with wages over the course of the last several decades. It is no mistake that as wages and safety net spending declined since 1980, income inequality skyrocketed. Policymakers like Mick Mulvaney argue that, in light of this dilemma, fiscal restraint is necessary anyway. The United States is the wealthiest, most resourceful country on Earth, with the means to alleviate suffering at home and abroad so fiscal responsibility may be an offered justification for Mulvaney's cohort yet one without merit.

If anything, the expenditures of safety net measures are investments that help families prosper and the economy grow. We have the capability, on many levels, to remedy what ails the working class yet we choose not to do it -- all in the service of rewarding the fittest and punishing the unworthy and in the name of fiscal prudence.