In 1986, Trump brashly rebuilt Wollman Ice Rink in Central Park when the city was too incompetent to manage this task. This was Trump’s defining moment. He was the hero of New York! He bested the Koch administration! Everything that Trump does today is an attempt to relive that special moment.
Now, I don’t blame Trump for his love of the 1980s. In 1986, I was dancing to Madonna and REM at college dorms and dance clubs in the Lower East Side. My hair was big, my skirts were short. But I’ve moved on. Trump hasn’t.
In his never-ending quest to relive his glory days, Trump gave Musk and his DOGE dogs free rein to eliminate waste in the federal bureaucracy. The goal was to create a surplus, which would result in a $4.5 trillion tax rebate to Americans. Convinced that private businessmen are the smartest and that government is corrupt, he thought he could pull off another Wollman Park miracle. It’s not working out.
Trump wants to hand out a fat tax rebate check to Americans and be adored like the good old days, but DOGE isn’t turning up the saving numbers that he expected. If Trump and Republicans want to hand out a tax rebate, they will have to cut big, important things. Republicans have proposed $880 billion in Medicaid cuts to make his projected numbers. Cuts to Medicaid will cause massive pain to beneficiaries and bring major chaos to state and local government.
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