After missing self-imposed deadline after deadline, our cabinet has finally agreed on the terms of the reformist budget, passed to Parliament on May 30 for more bickering. Never mind that it is now June, and we still have no budget set for 2019. Nor that projected rate of reduction of the budget deficit seems more like a slight of hand, at best. Our political class were careful in who they targeted to pay the price for these new austerity measures. Not their followers, whose support is maintained by way of unwarranted transactions and the granting of jobs without legal definitions. No, those bearing the brunt are those without a vote—such as our proud military pensioners. This reformist budget will also require more from us, the citizens, via direct and indirect taxation. If Lebanon was a corporation, its management would need to be fired and fired fast. A company’s budget ought
