Joan McCarter over at Daily Kos writes:

"Take it from a Republican, not just any Republican but a domestic policy adviser to President Ronald Reagan and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the Treasury Department in the Bush 41 White House."

That would be Bruce Bartlett. Bruce Bartlett was the senior economic advisor to Ronald Reagan, he was the domestic policy adviser and he was the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the Treasury Department during George Herbert Walker Bush's presidency. This guy has impeccable Republican credentials. He helped shape the Reagan and post Reagan era. And he woke up.

Bruce Bartlett figured out the scam that the Republicans are running. He tweeted:

"Literally the second the ink is dry on the tax cut, deficit hawks will emerge from their hibernation, where they have had nary a word of criticism about increasing the deficit by $1.5 trillion, to demand that SS & Medicare be slashed b/c the deficit has mysteriously increased."

This is a prediction and I absolutely agree with Bruce Bartlett - I believe that this prediction is 100% true because every single time in the past that this kind of a scenario has happened, this is what's happened.

He goes on to say in a piece he wrote for the Washington Post:

"They've played this game before...

"For decades, conservative intellectuals have pushed for big tax cuts; less to grow the economy and more because they want to 'starve the beast.' They want to force a major overall spending cut that would be a political non-starter without first passing a tax cut that creates a deficit so large, something must be done about it."

And this is this is nakedly an attempt to cut Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid.

That's what's going on.

-Thom

(What do you think? Tell us here.)