Then wouldn't it make sense to get spending under control and cut the fat instead if continuing to enable the irresponsibility by increasing the tax burden on people already having too much taken out of their paychecks as it is?
Not so easy, when the majority of the budget is consumed by entitlement programs. Republicans did, of course, try very recently to convert an open-ended entitlement program into block grants to the states. You opposed it.
One of Trump's big issues in 2016 was fixing infrastructure. He also ran on making no changes to Social Security and Medicare. His supporters - the working poor who've been devastated by globalization - want these things, even if conservatives don't. They want the government's programs that preserve their security in old age to be maintained, and they want the jobs that will come from infrastructure spending.
Now you can reflexively oppose such things, or you can do as I do - take the position that, fine - you want these things, then be prepared to pay for them. I don't disagree that more infrastructure spending may be appropriate - so many roads and bridges are in disrepair, and I think it ought to be a national security priority to harden the electric grid. But nothing's free. So, yeah, raise the gas tax. It's irresponsible not to.
