Gold standard has nothing to do with it.
Gold standard wouldn’t keep politicians from pandering to the gays.
Gold standard wouldn’t stop congress from borrowing. They’d just promise that your children would repay in gold instead.
But to borrow you need lenders. Plus, you have to pay interest, which people notice. Immeasurably more largesse derives from dollars conjured out of thin air by the Fed. Inflation is the perfectest of taxes from government’s point of view. It’s mostly hidden, easily blamable on other factors, and no one likes the hardest hit—savers—anyway.