Republicans Deserve to Lose, but Democrats Do Not Deserve to Win.
by
Ron Paul | Nov 2, 2026
Anyone wondering why the Republicans are facing historic losses in this week’s midterm elections should consider these two numbers: 3.7 percent and 0.6 precent. The first is the latest one year increase in prices from the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The second is how much wages and salaries for private industry workers are reported to have fallen in the last year when adjusted to account for the rise in prices. Even Americans with increasing incomes are struggling with inflation.
In the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump, who was promising to focus on affordability, recaptured the White House, giving Republicans complete control of the federal government. Yet, a gallon of gas now costs about a dollar more than when President Trump was inaugurated. Other prices have increased as well. For example, food prices have risen since President Trump took office.
One factor causing food and fuel costs to rise is President Trump’s breaking of his major campaign promise to oppose war. Iran predictably reacted to Israel and the US going to war against it by closing the Strait of Hormuz, resulting in reduced global oil supply. Increased fuel costs led to increased shipping costs, thus making food and other goods more expensive.
According to the “official figures” from the Pentagon, the Iran War has so far cost the government 47 billion dollars. A more accurate estimate of the cost of the war was made by Stephen Semler of the Security Policy Reform Institute. His study considers additional costs including the cost of damage to US bases in the war. According to his estimate, the government spent 103 billion dollars in just the conflict’s first four months.
The government’s debt was already 38.5 trillion dollars before the Iran war, with over two trillion dollars of that debt incurred in 2025.
The Trump-era Republican record of debt and war makes Republicans, with few exceptions, unworthy of support. However, many Democrats offer an unacceptable alternative.
Some Democratic candidates are openly socialist. Others who do not call themselves socialist do advocate socialist policies. Libertarians and America First conservatives may be able to work with even the most far left Democrat to end the Iran War and US taxpayer support for Israel’s military actions against the Palestinians. However, even some Democrats who call themselves antiwar support “defensive” military aid to Israel, as well as continued aid for Ukraine.
Domestically, many Democratic candidates favor a massive expansion of the welfare state. For example, a number of them support a Canadian-style single payer health care system despite well-documented failures. Many also favor increased taxes on the rich, despite the economic damage this will cause and the fact that tax increases on the wealthy inevitably trickle down to the middle and working classes.
Many progressives support modern monetary theory. This is an updated version of the old idea that the government need not worry about spending too much as long as the central bank can keep interest rates low and monetize the debt. They ignore that this increases the inflation tax, which hits the poor the hardest. This policy would eventually cause a dollar crisis, which would lead to a major economic crisis. President Trump’s preferred monetary policy of perpetual interest rate cuts would also devalue the dollar and cause an economic crisis.
A choice between the Republicans’ corporatism and the Democrats’ socialism is a sad choice. The bright side is that the continued failure of both left- and right-wing authoritarianism will lead more people to embrace the only path to peace and prosperity: liberty.
