One of the Washington Post's left-wing columnists, Catherine Rampell. is giving advice to Democrats that they should run on the "kids" issue.

She brings up the border issue with its illegal immigration issue as related to "kids," for one thing.

That's funny: I somehow can't recall a single instance of where she gave a damn about kids at the border during Obama's eight years.  Trump is actually trying to keep families together by encouraging illegals not to break the law in the first place.  He's also discouraging and stopping human-traffickers from taking control of kids on the way to the U.S.

Yet here is what Rampell has to say about it:

A winning theme for Democrats?  Kids.

And if President Trump gets his way, he would snatch more money away from children.

His administration's 2019 budget slashes funding for children's programs almost across the board.  Relative to spending under current law, for instance, he would cut child-care assistance and Head Start funding by about 30 percent each.

And last week, we learned the administration is killing two separate rules that would help prevent students from being scammed by for-profit programs offering useless degrees.  Meanwhile, instead of helping young people gain skills that will be useful in our increasingly high-tech and service-driven economy, Trump fixates on reviving jobs in dying industries such as coal.

I believe that Republicans should go at the Democrats on the kids issue.

Everything Rampell seems to think is necessary for children, in her mind, seems to come from the government.  However, the opposite is true.  The greatest help to children actually comes from a faster growing economy.  Think of how much better it is for children if the economy grows at 3% versus less than 2%.  Think how much better it is if fewer people are on disability and food stamps and more are earning paychecks.  Think how much better it is if black, Hispanic and female unemployment rates are at or near all-time lows – and what that means for their children.  Manufacturing jobs are up by over 300,000 since Trump took office, following claims of Obama and other Democrats, who said those jobs would never come back and made no effort to get them back.

Think of the multiplier effect of the 300,000 good-paying jobs and how many children that helps.

Democrats want kids either to die in the womb or else to grow up to be dependent on government.

Republicans want not only to save the children in the womb (especially black and Hispanic children), but ensure they grow up to be independent and have the opportunity to move up the economic ladder that capitalism gives them.

There is absolutely nothing progressive or compassionate about wanting government to have all the power and money.

Economic growth is great for all races, sexes, and creeds and people of all ages.  That's obvious enough to us in the age of Trump.  Yet for all the Democrats' protestations about being for "kids," not once in Obama's years of big government did he get a 3% annual growth figure.

In fact, a huge number of supposed experts predicted that the U.S. economy would collapse under President Trump, and they were 100% wrong.  The economy is hitting on all cylinders now, and people at the lower and middle income scale are seeing substantial wage increases in many cases.  Here are just a few examples of wage increases in the last year:

Bank teller: up 8.1%, truck-driver: up 7.1%, warehouse associate: up 6.6%, cashier: up 4.9%.

Think of all the kids helped by having more parents getting more money from work instead of more money from government.  Independence is also great for morale, especially for future generations.  Just look at this:

With the official unemployment rate at an 18-year low, blue-collar workers are in high demand.

Median base pay for workers in the United States climbed by 1.6 percent in June to $52,052, according to the latest edition of Glassdoor's Local Pay Report.  That was the strongest growth in the wage statistic so far in 2018.

"With unemployment hovering around historic lows, employers' need to fill roles climbs," said Glassdoor Chief Economist Andrew Chamberlain in a press release.  "What results is that more workers, especially in high demand industries like healthcare, finance, and e-commerce, are in the driver's seat to negotiate for better pay in order to fill these roles."

The Glassdoor data showed that traditional blue-collar jobs – such as truck driver, warehouse associate, and materials handler – posted large wage gains.  The increases were tied to the increasing demand for manpower in those areas created by growth in e-commerce, and Chamberlain expects that wages for these positions will continue to climb throughout 2018.

I look forward to Democrats running on big government and reversing the tax cuts when the economy is doing so well.  They should tell the people that the government knows better how to spend the money than they do.