For a while there, the Republican tax bill contained a provision that would be difficult to describe as a “silver lining,” given how comprehensively destructive the rest of the bill is, but could reasonably have been described as “not bad.” The provision was set to prevent cities from using tax-exempt bonds to finance sports stadiums.
The final version of the tax bill passed last night, and guess what? The bit about the tax-exempt bonds didn’t make the final cut. From the Wall Street Journal:
The bill also preserves the ability to use tax-exempt bonds for professional sports stadium bonds—a priority for Mr. Trump, a GOP aide said.
The fact that removing that piece of the bill was such a priority for Trump is interesting, given that his previous attacks on the NFL have included threats to end the stadium scam:
It’s almost as if everything Trump says in public is just disingenuous posturing meant to stoke racial and populist outrage among his base, who are then too angry and distracted to notice that he’s never, ever going to favor them over his obscenely rich friends.
[WSJ]