Donald Trump Has this One Weird Tax Trick

Donald Trump is trying to sell us on his one weird trick to make our economy bang along on all cylinders:

The trick is pretty simple--he will just lower all the taxes. This probably would not really work very well at all--numbers crunchers think it will cost us a hefty extra $10.8 trillion on the national debt in a decade.

Even if this had a modest effect on economic growth (which I hesitatingly concede is possible in the short term) the long-term effect on the debt is terrible. Would conservatives, especially deficit hawks, go for this nonsense? Not really. This is actually more of a treat to the rich folks than Jeb Bush's scheme. But the populist ticket is, it eliminates tax responsibility for the folks at the bottom. He's counting on the mostly broke to flock to a plan to let rich people and corporations skate on their privilege and do less to keep the government that lowest tax bracket relies on the most running, with a promise of lower taxes, because...

I think this was last-minute pulled out of some ass somewhere, actually, because in the real world, that doesn't make any damn sense. It sounds like Trump being lead dog, wants to appear to have policy ideas, while not actually having any serious grounding in what solid policy would look like.

This running for president thing, Trump concedes, has left him running towards beefing with his fellow GOP candidates in a way that might be "childish", and he also admits there might come a time when he should probably bow out. It looks to me like he's still in an enamored-with-the-idea of the White House becoming a temporary Trump property state of mind, in that this tax plan looks like a "say-anything" bid for people to love him. But what if the love for a candidate relied on more than big gestures, and over the long term, needed someone who was consistent and had compassion for people and demanded a relationship that wasn't about magnifying this one guy, but making us all work better?

I still don't see how this Trump thing is supposed to be happening. Oh it could. But like taking a barrel over Niagara Falls, it isn't going to be as thrilling as it is potentially dangerous.