The 2024 Republican Party platform promises to curb inflation if Donald Trump returns to the White House and Republicans gain full control of Congress. The platform includes proposals that could lower prices in some sectors and boost economic growth, such as deregulation and extending the 2017 tax cuts. But the platform makes no mention of how the Federal Reserve's encouragement of spendthrift politicians contributes to price inflation.
Aside from a mandatory promise to cut “wasteful” spending and a pledge to abolish the Department of Education, the Republican platform says very little about proposing cuts to federal spending.
The Republicans' apparent desire to increase military spending is disappointing to those of us who hoped that skepticism of foreign intervention among Republican voters would weaken the GOP's enthusiasm for the military-industrial complex. The platform also opposes cuts to Social Security and Medicare. That is, “fiscally responsible” Republicans want to increase spending on one of the largest categories of federal spending (“defense”) while opposing cuts to the other two (Social Security and Medicare). Interest on the national debt, the other major spending category, will continue to rise under a Republican administration. The only way Republicans can appear to be advocates of small government is by comparing them with Democrats.
It is unfortunate, but not surprising, that the Republican platform rejects fiscal responsibility. President Trump has added $7-8 trillion to the national debt. While spending certainly exploded with the COVID-19 lockdowns, the debt grew by trillions of dollars between Trump's inauguration and the COVID-19 spending spree. Spending grew during Trump's first two years in office when Republicans controlled Congress. This is not the first time a Republican president has broken a promise to cut spending. Both Presidents Bush and Reagan campaigned on spending cuts, but increased spending and the debt during their presidencies.
Politicians cannot increase the national debt unless the Federal Reserve liquidates it by buying Treasury bonds to increase the money supply and keep interest rates low. The need to liquidate the debt is the main reason central banks must keep interest rates from rising near market levels. According to Brian Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, every 1 percent increase in interest rates increases the federal government's interest payments by $35 trillion over 30 years.
It is no coincidence that the rise of a debt economy with ever-increasing consumer, corporate, and (especially) government debt, and the rapid decline in the purchasing power of the dollar that reduced Americans' standard of living, all occurred after President Nixon severed the dollar's final link to gold. Yet the Republican platform does not call for Congress to pass an audit of the Federal Reserve, much less create a free market in money by legalizing competing currencies. Of course, the platform does not support ending the Federal Reserve's ability to monetize federal debt by prohibiting the Federal Reserve from purchasing federal debt securities.
It is up to those of us who know the truth to continue spreading the message that the real key to making America great again is to make money real again by abolishing audits and the Federal Reserve.
Ron Paul is a former U.S. Congressman from Texas. This article originally appeared on the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity and is reprinted here with permission.
