For one thing, I’ve been broke before. A lot of media people have never had that experience. Having to pay for gas with quarters you found in your cup holder has a clarifying effect. For another, regardless of your own personal experiences, being America First should fundamentally mean caring about and prioritizing the well being of your own people, Americans. Downplaying affordability concerns is antithetical to America First principles as I see it. Finally, I’ll note that a lot of conservative commentators have a “bootstraps” mentality that always wants to emphasize personal responsibility over policy solutions. I understand that reflex and share that mentality to a large extent, as anyone who’s followed me for a while knows. Still, no amount of personal responsibility by an individual citizen can bring about mass deportations, or the end of the Welfare State that’s bleeding the working man dry, nor can it stop pointless foreign wars, or address any of a dozen other policy-level issues that are causing every day life to be far more costly and financially burdensome than it should be.