House Speaker Paul Ryan has started rolling out that big policy vision thing that is supposed to show Republicans have big ideas for 2016 even if Donald Trump is pretty much bankrupt when it comes to policy. This is also supposed to be the major accomplishment House Republicans will take into the November election, despite the fact that they only have 20 days to achieve it, a pipe dream. There's also the problem that he doesn't have any new, big ideas. The first proposal he's rolling out, on fighting poverty, proves that.
Speaker Paul Ryan and House Republicans will roll out a new plan on Tuesday to fight poverty and help Americans move up the economic ladder, yet much of this latest initiative is repackaged GOP proposals likely to win only limited support from Democrats. […]
Much of it focused on reforming federal welfare programs. The GOP recommendations include: expanded work requirements for those receiving federal welfare, food or housing assistance; more "flexibility" for state and local governments to improve programs, although what that means isn't always fully defined; consolidation of dozens of existing federal programs into fewer, better run efforts; improved accountability for federal programs while "rewarding" those which show the best results; more effectively target those Americans in greatest need of help; and reducing waste and duplication, a mantra for politicians in both parties every election year.
Basically, it means turning a lot of programs into block grants, a surefire way of putting them on a path to destruction.
The other thing they want to destroy is Dodd-Frank, because of course getting rid of what bank regulations the law managed to impose is critical to fighting poverty. Among the regulations they're taking aim at is the new one from the Labor Department that says the financial industry has to put the retirement investor before their own profits. Because there's nothing like making sure financial advisers line their pockets in order to fight senior poverty.