Look what Taylor Swift made House Speaker Paul Ryan do

House Speaker Paul Ryan played music historian Friday to promote his tax reform initiative that critics say would provide tax cuts for corporations and the wealthiest Americans: He tapped the pop culture power of Taylor Swift.

The Republican congressman from Wisconsin Tweeted a meme that tracked how Billboard’s chart-topping songs have evolved rom 1986 to 2017, from The Bangles’ “Walk Like an Egyptian” to Swift’s new No. 1, “Look What You Made Me Do.”

“America’s music tastes have changed since 1986, but our tax code hasn’t. It’s time,” Ryan tweeted on Friday. His argument relies on the fact that since pop music isn’t the same as it was 31 years ago, the United States’ tax code shouldn’t be stagnant, either.

We’d argue that since both songs kind of, well, stink, has pop music really changed all that much?

This, of course, had others in Washington tweeting their own memes, perhaps inspired by Utah Rep. Chris Stewart’s post on Wednesday that depicts a red rotary phone in 1986 and an iPhone today.

Entertainment Weekly weighed in with its headline, “Bad Paul Ryan Taylor Swift meme destroyed by Internet.”

Swift, who is titling her coming album “Reputation,” has yet to tweet or write a song about Ryan.

This story was originally published September 22, 2017 at 4:49 PM with the headline "Look what Taylor Swift made House Speaker Paul Ryan do."