1. Bush is under funding education. The President cut $200 million from his own No Child Left Behind Act, eliminating crucial educational programs for lower income children and cutting professional training for more than 20,000 teachers. Flawed from its very foundation, No Child Left Behind is based on then-Governor Bush's late-?'90s "Texas Miracle,"?-a program of standardized testing designed to increase performance and reduce dropout rates--now recognized as a scandalous failure. In addition, he cut AIDs research two days after praisng it's importance.
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0338/schanberg.php
2. Bush is underfunding homeland security : While energetic in waging war abroad, the Bush administration has been oddly lethargic in fortifying our defenses at home. Domestic security agencies have been neglected. Police and firefighters have been denied essential resources, and muddled public strategy has only spread alarm and confusion.
http://www.ppionline.org/
3. Dividing the nation both in partisan terms and economic ones so radically after it banded together so well immediately following 9/11. There are many ways this was done but the one of the methods that most bothers me is by assigning people like Aschcroft and other controversial people to top level federal positions. The Bush administration has nominated such right wing extermeists as Charles Pickering who has openly questioned the federal government's right toenforce pollution and voting rights laws, has openly spoken out against Roe vs. Wade, and Carolyn Kuh, who has fiercely fought for tax-exempt status for segregated Bob Jones University.
4. Abandoning any notion of small govt. or fiscal responsibility. This is indicatd by fiscally irresponsible policies such as unlimited pork barrel spending, huge payoffs to biggest political contributors , unneccesary tax cuts that overwhelmingly (something like 90%) benefit those in the top income class, those already making millions an year when tax cuts to the poor would undoubtedly stimulate spending and encourage job growth and economic recovery. One example is the recent prescription drug plan which provides very little help to most elderly, will actualy leave some elderly paying more than they currently do, takes away the government's right to negotiate with drug companies for lower prices and yet will still cost tax payers $400 billion dollars over 10 years and 2 trillion the next decade by offering up tens of billions in entitlements to drug companies.
The Bush administration, backed by the Republican-controlled Congress, has been promoting larger government at almost every turn. Its spending policies have been irresponsible, and its trade strategies have been destructive. The president has been quite willing to sell out the national interest for perceived political gain, whether the votes sought are from seniors or farmers. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 encouraged the administration to push into law civil-liberties restrictions that should worry anyone, whether they are wielded by a Bush or a Clinton administration.
5. Essentially desicrating the constitution by throwing support behind sodomy laws that regulate what kind of intercourse two consenting adults can engage in in the privacy of their own bedrooms, restricting protestors to "freedom zones" miles away from where the president is speaking or the media is present, passing the patriot acts. (Acts that allow for the FBI to monitor emails and phones without a warrant, that allow the govt. to hold people in detainment without ever pressing charges, obtaining a warrant, presenting evidence, allowing them to attain legal representation, or offering them a trial. Now these acts are being used by prosecutors to go fishing for information on just about anyone who moves sums of money around. Under Secton 314 of the Patriot Act , the government can secretly demand that stockbrokers, banks and other financial institutions turn over the records of anyone "suspected" of anything down to money laundering without a judge's or grand jury's permission.)
The Bush Administration's Patriot Act threatens our constitutional rights and civil liberties. Passed by a post 9/11 Congress, the Patriot act expands the ability of law enforcement to conduct secret searches, and engage various forms of surveillance, including internet monitoring and wiretapping. It gives the FBI access to American citizens' highly personal medical, financial, mental health, and student records without notification or permission, and allows them to investigate individuals without probable cause of a crime. Finally, it permits non-citizens to be jailed based on mere suspicion and held indefinitely in six month increments without meaningful judicial review.
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=12126&c=207
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, in a 2-1 decision, said the administration has no inherent constitutional power to sidestep the normal procedures required to imprison a U.S. citizen seized on American soil indicating that the Bush administration overstepped it's authority. It also rejected the government's claim that it possessed legislative authority to lock up Padilla by virtue of the congressional joint resolution authorizing the war against Iraq. The appellate panel said that the president's power as commander in chief does not override "the domestic rule of law." Congress and the courts, it said, cannot simply be bypassed. The Bush administration has promised to fight this ruling.
6. The Bush Administration's regressive environmental policies have lowered cleanliness standards for our air and water while allowing utility companies (many of whom are Bush campaign contributors) to profit off of the weakened regulations. In 2002, the head of the EPA's Office of Regulatory Enforcement resigned, complaining that the agency was "fighting a White House that seems determined to weaken the rules we are trying to enforce." (CNN, Aug. 22, 2002)
The Bush Record on the Environment for 2003:
http://www.nrdc.org/bushrecord/2003.asp
7. It appears that the Bush Administration has consistently misled the American public about Iraq , most significantly regarding Saddam Hussein's possession of weapons of mass destruction and his ties to al Queda and Osama bin Laden.
http://www.fair.org/press-releases/beyond-niger.html
8. Bush's Tax Cuts only benefit the rich. Bush claimed that his tax cut would "reduce tax rates for everyone who pays income tax." He failed to mention that this "relief" program would put half of the tax cut's dividends into the hands of our nation's wealthiest 5%, while 8.1 million citizens in the bottom half of the income bracket receive approximately $300 a year.
http://www.ctj.org/html/gwbfinal.htm
9. 3.3 million jobs (93,000 in August of 2003 alone) have been lost since Bush took office--more than the last 11 Presidents combined. (Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 2001-August 2003) Meanwhile, huge corporations are paying fewer taxes than ever:
http://www.cbpp.org/10-16-03tax.htm
10. Removing any amounts of secularism the govt. still had with blatant religious references, supporting putting up the 10 commandments outside of courtrroms, throw so much support for religion based charitable organizations, calling gays immoral and sinful based on the bible, ostracizing a significant portion of the population and giving other more inclusive christians a bad name.
11. Cut state and local funding to the point of bankrupcy while increasing federal funding without a second thought.
12. His extermely partisan focus and his anything for his supporters attitude has pushed through billions of dollars in sweetheart deals to big businesses and pharmacetical companies effectively splitting the nation in half at a time when the need for national unity is greater than ever.
13. His lack of financial restriant, uncontrolled spending at tough economic times, refusal to take a stand against pork barrel politcs, allowed for the balloning of the federal defecit in favor of big govt.
14. His blatant disregard for seperation of church and state and equal rights for all including gays is only ostracizing people and increasing the national divide.
(If you aren't already familiar with the now famous illustrated document in it's entirity, I strongly urge you to check it out by clicking here.)
"You can't say one thing and do another."-- George W. Bush, 10/31/00
"This is a hospital, but it's also - it's a place full of love. And I was most touched by meeting the parents and the kids and the nurses and the docs, all of whom are working hard to save lives. I want to thank the moms who are here. Thank you very much for you hospitality There's a lot of talk about budgets right now, and I'm here to talk about the budget. My job as the President is to submit a budget to the Congress and to set priorities, and one of the priorities that we've talked about is making sure the health care systems are funded." - Egleston Children's Hospital, Atlanta, Georgia 3/1/01. (Bush's first budget proposed cutting grants to children's hospitals like the one he visited by 15% ($34 million). His 2004 budget additionally proposes to cut 30% ($86 million) out of grants to children's hospitals.)
"Part of being a secure America is to encourage homeownership." He also went on to talk about his experience meeting the residents saying, "You know, today I went to the -- to some of the home -- met some of the homeowners in this newly built homes and all you've got to do is shake their hand and listen to their stories and watch the pride that they exhibit when they show you the kitchen and the stairs...They showed me their home. They didn't show me somebody else's home, they showed me their home. And they are so proud to own their home and I want to thank them for their hospitality, because it helps the American people really understand what it means." - Bush, 6/17/02 (According to AP, "President Bush's proposed 2004 budget for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, announced Monday, phases out HOPE VI" the program Bush visited and touted in Atlanta. "Renee Glover, executive director of the Atlanta Housing Authority said. ?'We didn't anticipate that HOPE VI would be eliminated.'" [AP, 2/5/2003])
"Our workers are the most productive, the hardest working, the best craftsmen in the world. And I'm here to thank all those who work hard to make a living here in America." - Bush, 9/2/02 (Bush's 2003 Budget proposed a 9% ($476 million) cut to job training programs and a 2% ($8 million) cut to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Similarly, his 2004 budget proposes a $60 million cut to adult job training programs and a total elimination of the Youth Opportunities Grants, which provide job training to younger workers.)
"I want to thank the good folks here at Rochester Community and Technical College for your hospitality The most important issue -- the most important issue for any governor in any state is to make sure every single child in your state receives a quality education." - Bush, [10/18/02] (Bush's 2004 budget proposes to cut vocational and technical education grants by 24% ($307 million). His budget also proposes to freeze funding for pell grants for low income students.)
"These men and women are still the best of America. They are prepared for every mission we give them, and they are worthy of the standards set for them by America's veterans. Our veterans from every era are the finest of citizens. We owe them the life we know today. They command the respect of the American people, and they have our everlasting gratitude." - Bush, 11/11/02 (According to a letter sent to the President by the major veterans groups, Bush's 2003 budget "falls $1.5 billion short" of adequately funding veterans care. [Independent Budget, 1/7/02].)
"I hope people around this country realize that agencies such as this food bank need money. They need our contributions. Contributions are down. They shouldn't be down in a time of need. We shouldn't let the enemy affect us to the point where we become less generous. Our spirit should never be diminished by what happened on September the 11th, 2001. Quite the contrary. We must stand squarely in the face of evil by doing some good." - Bush, 12/19/02 (The 2003 and 2004 Bush budgets proposes to freeze the Congregate Nutrition Program, which assists local soup kitchens and meals on wheels programs. With inflation, this proposal would mean at least 36,000 seniors would be cut from meals on wheels and congregate meals programs. Currently, 139,000 seniors are already on waiting lists for home-meal programs. His 2004 budget continues the freeze.)
"This administration is committed to your effort. And with the support of Congress, we will continue to work to provide the resources school need to fund the era of reform." - Bush, 1/8/03 (The President's 2003 budget - the first education budget after he signed and touted the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) - proposed to cut NCLB programs by $90 million overall, leaving these programs more than $7 billion short of what was authorized under the bill. Bush's 2004 budget for NCLB is just 1.9% above what he proposed in 2003 - $619 less than needed to offset inflation.)
"Within that budget I proposed last night is a substantial increase in Medicare funding of $400 billion on top of what we already spend, over the next 10 years. This is a commitment that America must make to our seniors. A reformed and strengthened Medicare system, plus a healthy dosage of Medicare spending in the budget, will make us say firmly, we fulfilled our promise to the seniors of America." - Bush, 1/29/03 (Under Bush's proposal, there should be a roughly $40 billion increase in Medicare each year for a decade. However, Bush's 2004 budget proposes just $6 billion - 85% less than what would be needed to meet his goal. Additionally, his budget would leave 67% of the total $400 billion pledge to be spent after 2008. [Bush Budget, pg. 318])
Under the headline "Bush lauds Albuquerque woman for volunteerism" the AP reported on Bush's visit to New Mexico to tout Lucy Salazar, a volunteer with the Even Start literacy program. "One of the things I try to do when I go into communities is herald soldiers in the armies of compassion, those souls who have heard the call to love a neighbor like you'd like to be loved yourself, and have followed through on that call; Lucy Salazar is a retired federal government worker. She teaches reading skills to pre-kindergarten and kindergarten children -- incredibly important And oftentimes, citizens such as her never get the praise they deserve. Lucy, thank you for coming and representing thousands of people like you." - Bush, 4/29/02 (According to the Associated Press, Bush proposed "to slash funding 20 percent for the Even Start program, which offers tutoring to preschoolers and literacy and job training for their parents" - the very program he was touting in New Mexico [2/4/02].)
"I said when I was running for President, I supported ethanol, and I meant it. (Applause.) I support it now, because not only do I know it's important for the ag sector of our economy, it's an important part of making sure we become less reliant on foreign sources of energy." - Bush at South Dakota Ethanol Plant 4/24/02 (According to the AP, Bush's 2004 budget proposes to eliminate funding for the bioenergy program that funds the Dakota Ethanol Plant he visited. [4/22/02])
"If you overspend, it creates a fundamental weakness in the foundation of economic growth. And so I'm working with Congress to make sure they hear the message -- the message of fiscal responsibility."-- 9/16/02 (Less than 6 months later, Bush proposed a budget that would put the government more than $300 billion into deficit.)
"Having been here and seeing the care that these troops get is comforting for me and Laura. We are -- should and must provide the best care for anybody who is willing to put their life in harm's way."-- Walter Reed Army Hospital, 1/17/03 (That same day the Bush Administration cut off access to its health care system from approximately 164,000 veterans.)
"We're dealing with first-time responders to make sure they've got what's needed to be able to respond."-- 3/27/02 (Bush said he was proposing $3.5 billion in "new" money for first responders, but he actually tried to rob more than $1 billion from existing grants to local police/fire departments to fund his proposal. In August 2002, Bush rejected another $150 million for grants to state and local first responders.)
"We're working hard to make sure your job is easier, that the port is safer. The Customs Service is working with overseas ports and shippers to improve its knowledge of container shipments, assessing risk so that we have a better feel of who we ought to look at, what we ought to worry about."-- 6/24/02 (Bush's 2003 and 2004 budgets provide nothing for port security grants. In August, he vetoed all $39 million for the Container Security Initiative that he specifically touted.)
"A secure and efficient border is key to our economic security."-- 9/9/02 (Bush promised more INS/Border Patrol staff and facilities, but provided no funding. He vetoed $6.25 million for promised pay upgrades for Border Patrol agents, and his 2004 Budget slashes "Border and Transportation Security" by $284 million.)
"We've got to do more to protect worker pensions."-- 8/7/02 (The Bush Administration proposed new rules so employers could resume converting traditional pension plans to new ?'cash balance' plans that can lower benefits of long-serving workers.) "Companies favor these plans because they can slash a worker's pension benefit by 20 to 50 percent in one fell swoop."-- Rep. Bernard Sanders (I-VT.)
"A reformed and strengthened Medicare system, plus a healthy dosage of Medicare spending in the budget, will make us say firmly, we fulfilled our promise to the seniors of America."-- 1/29/03 (Bush's 2004 budget proposes 85% less than what would be needed to meet his goal, and would leave 67% of the total $400 billion pledge to be spent after 2008.)
"I want to thank the Boys & Girls Clubs across the country The Boys & Girls Club have got a grand history of helping children understand the future is bright for them, as well as any other child in America."-- 1/30/03 (Bush's 2002 budget proposed eliminating all federal funding for the Boys and Girls Club of America.)
"Clear Skies legislation, when passed by Congress, will significantly reduce smog and mercury emissions, as well as stop acid rain. It will put more money directly into programs to reduce pollution, so as to meet firm national air-quality goals. ..."-- Earth Day speech, 4/22/02 (Actually, the Clear Skies law delays required pollution emission cuts by as much as 10 years, weakens the states' power to address interstate pollution problems, and allows outdated industrial facilities to avoid costly pollution-control upgrades.)
So while the big lies about the war are exposed to the light, the Bush team is quietly working in the shadows?-chipping away at programs for veterans, the young, the old, and the poor?-funneling every possible dollar into their giant war machine so it will eventually end up in the pockets of friends and family. That is compassionate conservatism at its best.
Rhetoric vs. Reality
George W. Bush the candidate promised to put the nation's needy atop his agenda. But, while discretionary spending has balooned, funding for programs that benefit the poor and at-risk has been cut or frozen. MotherJones.com takes a quick look at how Bush's 'compassionate' talk measures up against his spending priorities.
Death By a Thousand Cuts: Bush Economics Hits Home
In order to understand why George W. Bush doesn't get it, you have to take several strands of common Texas attitude, then add an impressive degree of class-based obliviousness. What you end up with is a guy who sees himself as a perfectly nice fellow -- and who is genuinely disconnected from the impact of his decisions on people.
On the few occasions when Bush does directly encounter the down-and-out, he seems to empathize. But then, in what is becoming a recurring, almost nightmare-type scenario, the minute he visits some constructive program and praises it (AmeriCorps, the Boys and Girls Club, job training), he turns around and cuts the budget for it. It's the kiss of death if the president comes to praise your program. During the presidential debate in Boston in 2000, Bush said, "First and foremost, we've got to make sure we fully fund LIHEAP [the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program], which is a way to help low-income folks, particularly here in the East, pay their high fuel bills." He then sliced $300 million out of that sucker, even as people were dying of hypothermia, or, to put it bluntly, freezing to death.
Sometimes he even cuts your program before he comes to praise it. In August 2002, Bush held a photo op with the Quecreek coal miners, the nine men whose rescue had thrilled the country. By then he had already cut the coal-safety budget at the Mine Safety and Health Administration, which engineered the rescue, by 6 percent, and had named a coal-industry executive to run the agency.
The Reverend Jim Wallis, leader of Call to Renewal, a network of churches that fight poverty, told the New York Times that shortly after his election, Bush had said to him, "I don't understand how poor people think," and had described himself as a "white Republican guy who doesn't get it, but I'd like to." What's annoying about Bush is when this obtuseness, the blinkeredness of his life, weighs so heavily on others, as it has increasingly as he has acquired more power.
There was a telling episode in 1999 when the Department of Agriculture came out with its annual statistics on hunger, showing that once again Texas was near the top. Texas is a perennial leader in hunger because we have 43 counties in South Texas (and some in East Texas) that are like Third World countries. If our border region were a state, it would be first in poverty, first in the percentage of schoolchildren living in poverty, first in the percentage of adults without a high school diploma, 51st in income per capita, and so on.
When the 1999 hunger stats were announced, Bush threw a tantrum. He thought it was some malign Clinton plot to make his state look bad because he was running for president. "I saw the report that children in Texas are going hungry. Where?" he demanded. "No children are going to go hungry in this state. You'd think the governor would have heard if there are pockets of hunger in Texas." You would, wouldn't you? That is the point at which ignorance becomes inexcusable. In five years, Bush had never spent time with people in the colonias, South Texas' shantytowns; he had never been to a session with Valley Interfaith, a consortium of border churches and schools and the best community organization in the state. There is no excuse for a governor to be unaware of this huge reality of Texas.
Take any area -- environment, labor, education, taxes, health -- and go to the websites of public-interest groups in that field. You will find page after page of minor adjustments, quiet repeals, no-big-deal new policies, all of them cruel, destructive, and harmful. A silent change in regulations, an executive order, a funding cutoff. No headlines. Below the radar. Again and again and again. Head Start, everybody's favorite government program, is being targeted for "improvement" by leaving it to the tender mercies of Mississippi and Alabama. An AIDS program that helps refugees in Africa and Asia gets its funding cut because one of the seven groups involved once worked with the United Nations, which once worked with the Chinese government, which once supported forced abortions.
So what manner of monster is behind these outrages? I have known George W. Bush slightly since we were both in high school, and I studied him closely as governor. He is neither mean nor stupid. What we have here is a man shaped by three intertwining strands of Texas culture, combined with huge blinkers of class. The three Texas themes are religiosity, anti-intellectualism, and machismo. They all play well politically with certain constituencies.
Let's assume the religiosity is genuine; no one is in a position to know otherwise. I leave it to more learned commentators to address what "Christian" might actually mean in terms of public policy.
The anti-intellectualism is also authentic. This is a grudge Bush has carried at least since his college days when he felt looked down on as a frat rat by more cerebral types. Despite his pedigree and prep schools, he ran into Eastern stereotypes of Texans at Yale, a common experience at Ivy schools in that time. John F. Kennedy, the consummate, effortlessly graceful, classy Harvard man, had just been assassinated in ugly old Dallas, and Lyndon Johnson's public piety gave many people the creeps. Texans were more or less thought of as yahoo barbarians somewhere between the Beverly Hillbillies and Deliverance. I do not exaggerate by much. To have a Texas accent in the East in those days was to have 20 points automatically deducted from your estimated IQ. And Texans have this habit of playing to the stereotype -- it's irresistible. One proud Texan I know had never owned a pair of cowboy boots in his life until he got a Nieman Fellowship to Harvard. Just didn't want to let anyone down.
For most of us who grow up in the "boonies" and go to school in the East, it's like speaking two languages -- Bill Clinton, for example, is perfectly bilingual. But it's not unusual for a spell in the East to reinforce one's Texanness rather than erode it, and that's what happened to Bush. Bush had always had trouble reading -- we assume it is dyslexia (although Slate's Jacob Weisberg attributes it to aphasia); his mom was still doing flash cards with him when he was in junior high. Feeling intellectually inferior apparently fed into his resentment of Easterners and other known forms of snob.
Bush once said, "There's a West Texas populist streak in me, and it irritates me when these people come out to Midland and look at my friends with just the utmost disdain." In his mind, Midland is the true-blue heartland of the old vox pop. The irony is that Midland along with its twin city, Odessa, is one of the most stratified and narrow places in the country. Both are oil towns with amazingly strict class segregation. Midland is the white-collar, Republican town; Odessa is the blue-collar, Democratic town. The class conflict plays out in an annual football rivalry so intense that H.G. Bissinger featured it in his best-selling book, Friday Night Lights. To mistake Midland for the volk heartland is the West Texas equivalent of assuming that Greenwich, Connecticut, is Levittown.
In fact, people in Midland are real nice folks: I can't prove that with statistics, but I know West Texas and it's just a fact. Open, friendly, no side to 'em. The problem is, they're way isolated out there and way limited too. You can have dinner at the Petroleum Club anytime with a bunch of them and you'll come away saying, "Damn, those are nice people. Sure glad they don't run the world." It is still such a closed, narrow place, where everybody is white, Protestant, and agrees with everybody else. It's not unusual to find people who think, as George W. did when he lived there, that Jimmy Carter was leading the country toward "European-style socialism." A board member of the ACLU of Texas was asked recently if there had been any trouble with gay bashing in Midland. "Oh, hell, honey," she drawled, "there's not a gay in Midland who will come out of the closet for fear people will think they're Democrats."
The machismo is what I suspect is fake. Bush is just another upper-class white boy trying to prove he's tough. The minute he is questioned, he becomes testy and defensive. That's one reason they won't let him hold many press conferences. When he tells stories about his dealings with two of the toughest men who ever worked in politics -- the late Lee Atwater and the late Bob Bullock -- Bush, improbably, comes off as the toughest mother in the face-down. I wouldn't put money on it being true. Bullock, the late lieutenant governor and W's political mentor in Texas, could be and often was meaner than a skilletful of rattlesnakes. Bush's story is that one time, Bullock cordially informed him that he was about to **** him. Bush stood up and kissed Bullock, saying, "If I'm gonna get ****, at least I should be kissed." It probably happened, but I guarantee you Bullock won the fight. Bush never got what made Bullock more than just a supermacho pol -- the old son of a bitch was on the side of the people. Mostly.
The perfect absurdity of all this, of course, is that Bush's identification with the sturdy yeomen of Midland (actually, oil-company executives almost to a man) is so wildly at variance with his real background. Bush likes to claim the difference between him and his father is that, "He went to Greenwich Country Day and I went to San Jacinto Junior High." He did. For one year. Then his family moved to a posh neighborhood in Houston, and he went to the second-best prep school in town (couldn't get into the best one) before going off to Andover as a legacy.
Jim Hightower's great line about Bush, "Born on third and thinks he hit a triple," is still painfully true. Bush has simply never acknowledged that not only was he born with a silver spoon in his mouth -- he's been eating off it ever since. The reason there is no noblesse oblige about Dubya is because he doesn't admit to himself or anyone else that he owes his entire life to being named George W. Bush. He didn't just get a head start by being his father's son -- it remained the single most salient fact about him for most of his life. He got into Andover as a legacy. He got into Yale as a legacy. He got into Harvard Business School as a courtesy (he was turned down by the University of Texas Law School). He got into the Texas Air National Guard -- and sat out Vietnam -- through Daddy's influence. (I would like to point out that that particular unit of FANGers, as regular Air Force referred to the "**** Air National Guard," included not only the sons of Governor John Connally and Senator Lloyd Bentsen, but some actual black members as well -- they just happened to play football for the Dallas Cowboys.) Bush was set up in the oil business by friends of his father. He went broke and was bailed out by friends of his father. He went broke again and was bailed out again by friends of his father; he went broke yet again and was bailed out by some fellow Yalies.
That Bush's administration is salted with the sons of somebody-or-other should come as no surprise. I doubt it has ever even occurred to Bush that there is anything wrong with a class-driven good-ol'-boy system. That would explain why he surrounds himself with people like Eugene Scalia (son of Justice Antonin Scalia), whom he named solicitor of the Department of Labor -- apparently as a cruel joke. Before taking that job, the younger Scalia was a handsomely paid lobbyist working against ergonomic regulations designed to prevent repetitive stress injuries. His favorite technique was sarcastic invective against workers who supposedly faked injuries when the biggest hazard they faced was "dissatisfaction with co-workers and supervisors." More than 5 million Americans are injured on the job every year, and more die annually from work-related causes than were killed on September 11. Neither Scalia nor Bush has ever held a job requiring physical labor.
What is the disconnect? One can see it from the other side -- people's lives are being horribly affected by the Bush administration's policies, but they make no connection between what happens to them and the decisions made in Washington. I think I understand why so many people who are getting screwed do not know who is screwing them. What I don't get is the disconnect at the top. Is it that Bush doesn't want to see? No one brought it to his attention? He doesn't care?
Okay, we cut taxes for the rich and so we have to cut services for the poor. Presumably there is some right-wing justification along the lines that helping poor people just makes them more dependent or something. If there were a rationale Bush could express, it would be one thing, but to watch him not see, not make the connection, is another thing entirely. Welfare, Medicare, Social Security, food stamps -- horrors, they breed dependency. Whereas inheriting millions of dollars and having your whole life handed to you on a platter is good for the grit in your immortal soul? What we're dealing with here is a man in such serious denial it would be pathetic if it weren't damaging so many lives.
Bush's lies now fill volumes. He lied us into two hideously unfair tax cuts; he lied us into an unnecessary war with disastrous consequences; he lied us into the Patriot Act, eviscerating our freedoms. But when it comes to dealing with those less privileged, Bush's real problem is not deception, but self-deception.
His "No Child Left Behind" program violates every tenet of historical "local control" in K-12 education and provides arguably the largest federal intrusion into education in U.S. history!
His federal budget deficits are larger than any president's in American history; in fact TWICE as large as any previous record! This was achieved through uncontrolled pork barrel spending, huge entitlements to major corporations and no contract bids and tax rebates to his biggest political contributors.
The Bush administration, backed by the Republican-controlled Congress, has been promoting larger government at almost every turn. Its spending policies have been irresponsible, and its trade strategies have been destructive. The president has been quite willing to sell out the national interest for perceived political gain, whether the votes sought are from seniors or farmers.
The House recently passed a massive $373 billion spending bill, laden with pork-barrel spending and controversial provisions as far as the eye could see. "The size of the measure invites abuse. Spending set-asides for home-state projects have grown to extraordinary levels, filling scores of pages in the Congressional Record." President Bush issued a "personal appeal" to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) to "push the spending package through the Senate" without changes after the House passed the pork-laden bill." - AP, 12/8/03, 12/5/03, Wall Street Journal 12/3/08
"For the 2003 budget year, which ended Sept. 30, the government recorded a deficit of $374.8 billion, according to revised figures. In November alone, the deficit swelled to nearly $43 billion." - AP, 12/12/03
3. He has established the beginnings of a Medicare prescription drug plan that ALONE will soon cost taxpayers TWICE as much as federal welfare EVER DID!
The prescription drug plan which provides very little help to most elderly, will actually leave some elderly paying more than they currently do, take away the government's right to negotiate with drug companies for lower prices or purchase drugs cheaper from Canada and yet will still cost tax payers $400 billion dollars over 10 years and 2 trillion the next decade by offering up tens of billions in entitlements to drug companies.
"nder the new plan, seniors in the middle income quintile will pay an average of $1,650 a year in out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs in 2006. This figure is nearly 60 percent more than they paid in 2000, even after adjusting for inflation. Expenses are projected to continue to rise so that by 2013 middle-income seniors will be paying more than two and a half times as much for prescription drugs (adjusting for inflation) as they did in 2000." - Ctr. for Economic and Policy Research, 12/04/03
4. Bush is under funding education. The President cut $200 million from his own No Child Left Behind Act, eliminating crucial educational programs for lower income children and cutting professional training for more than 20,000 teachers. Flawed from its very foundation, No Child Left Behind is based on then-Governor Bush's late-?'90s "Texas Miracle,"?-a program of standardized testing designed to increase performance and reduce dropout rates--now recognized as a scandalous failure. In addition, he cut AIDs research two days after praisng it's importance.
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0338/schanberg.php
President Bush proposed a budget that was $9.7 billion below the amount needed to fund his own No Child Left Behind Bill. The budget eliminates 45 education programs, and slashes another 18 programs by $1.4 billion. Specifically, he proposes to cut $400 million (40%) out of after-school programs, resulting in 485,000 children being thrown off these programs. He proposes to freeze teacher training grants, meaning a loss of opportunity for 30,000 teachers. And, during a recession, he has proposed a $307 million cut for vocational/technical education grants, and a freeze on Pell Grants." - House Appropriations Committee report, 3/10/03
5. Bush is underfunding homeland security : While energetic in waging war abroad, the Bush administration has been oddly lethargic in fortifying our defenses at home. Domestic security agencies have been neglected. Police and firefighters have been denied essential resources, and muddled public strategy has only spread alarm and confusion.
http://www.ppionline.org/
"Emergency Responders are drastically underfunded and dangerously unprepared. The United States remains dangerously ill prepared to handle a catastrophic attack on American soil. On average, fire departments across the country have only enough radios to equip half the firefighters on a shift, and breathing apparatuses for only one-third. Police departments do not have the protective gear to safely secure a site following a WMD attack. Public health labs in most states still lack basic equipment and expertise to adequately respond to a chemical or biological attack. Most cities do not have the necessary equipment to determine what kind of hazardous materials emergency responders may be facing." - Council on Foreign Relations Report by former Sen. Warrren Rudman (R-NH), 7/29/03
The federal program that added more than 100,000 cops to local police forces is being rolled back because local governments can't afford to keep many of the officers on the street. Law enforcement analysts say that the largest federally funded buildup of local police in U.S. history is being washed away by cutbacks." - USA Today, 12/2/03
6. The administration pushed into law civil-liberties restrictions that should worry anyone who values liberty, whether they are wielded by a Bush or a Clinton administration.
They include...
allowing the FBI to monitor emails and phones without a warrant.
allowing the govt to hold people in prison indefinately without ever pressing charges, obtaining a warrant, presenting evidence, allowing them to attain legal representation, or offering them a trial.
giving the FBI access to American citizens' highly personal medical, financial, mental health, and student records without notification or permission, and allowing them to investigate individuals without probable cause of a crime.
Now these acts are being used by prosecutors to go fishing for information on just about anyone who moves sums of money around. Under Secton 314 of the Patriot Act , the government can secretly demand that stockbrokers, banks and other financial institutions turn over the records of anyone "suspected" of anything down to money laundering without a judge's or grand jury's permission.
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=12126&c=207
In addition, the administration has backed other violations on privacy by...
backing sodomy laws that regulate what kind of intercourse two consenting adults can engage in the PRIVACY OF THIER OWN BEDROOMS
arresting any protestors not found in designated "freedom zones" miles away from where the president is speaking or the media is present, while authorizing any people carrying signs that portray Bush positively to congregate whereever they so desire.
7. Cut state and local funding to the point of bankrupcy while increasing federal funding without a second thought. New York's federal funding has been so slashed that it's been forced to cut out all afterschool programs for kids.
8. He is calling for a return to the Moon: an enormous federal boondoggle that should make the libertarian wing cringe!
9. He has not made anywhere near a complete military commitment to capturing Osama bin Laden as he said he would!
10. He campaigned vigorously against the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform bill that was widely backed by republicans and democrats alike.
11. There's little reason to believe that Bush's tax cuts will have a positive impact on the economy. Economists suggest that any growth is the result of the holiday season and won't translate to sustainable improvement. Worse yet, the defecit created by these tax cuts and other fiscally irresponsible policies will lead to huge increases in interest rates and property taxes that'll cost tax payers even more. The evidence is presented and can be discussed here...
http://boards.ign.com/message.asp?topic=50193282&start=50198558
12. He has been extraordinarily tepid in his support of Taiwan's call for a declaration of its independence, in order to placate mainland China! He even threatened to back China's invasion of mainlad Taiwan if Taiwan doesn't cease it's request that China stop pointing it's nuclear missles squarely on Taiwan's largest cities.
13. The Administration is pushing a cut of $1.5 billion in military housing/medical facility funding for the military, despite the fact that UPI reports "hundreds of sick and wounded U.S. soldiers including many who served in the Iraq war are languishing in hot cement barracks here while they wait - sometimes for months - to see doctors." - Wash Post, 1/17/03, UPI, 10/17/03
14. "The chief of the Environmental Protection Agency's civil enforcement office has resigned, complaining the White House is undermining anti-pollution efforts at power plants that violate clean air laws. Eric Schaeffer, a lawyer at the EPA for a dozen years dating from the first Bush administration, said in a letter to EPA Administrator Christie Whitman that the White House "seems determined to weaken the rules we are trying to enforce." - CBS News, 3/1/02
"More than a dozen state attorneys general yesterday sought to block the federal government from implementing a rule change they argued would lead to more air pollution from the nation's power plants. Fourteen states, and a number of cities - including New York, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. - are seeking a court injunction to impede a measure by the Environmental Protection Agency before it goes into effect." - AP, 11/18/03
Two separate reports issued by the GAO and the Rockefeller Family Fund project and Council of State Governments stated that the Administration's relaxation of pollution rules for power plants would lead to reduced fines and pollution controls as well as 1.4 million tons more air pollution. - CBS News, 11/6/03
"The Administration is proposing to use a provision of the Clean Air Act never before used to regulate toxics and setting a level of reductions for mercury emissions far below what the Clean Air Act toxic provisions would require. Using the [traditional] provisions of the Clean Air Act would achieve at least a 90 percent reduction in mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants by 2008. The Administration's proposals suggest only a 30% reduction, to the benefit of Coal-fired power plants and utilities." - Former EPA Administrator Carol Browner, 12/4/03
2003: A YEAR OF DISTORTION FOR THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
On December 13th, the White House issued a document entitled "2003: A Year of Accomplishment for the American People." The document made various inaccurate and deceptive claims about the Administration's record over the last year. This report by the Center for American Progress seeks to correct those distortions, matching the White House's rhetoric with facts. Please note, text underlined in blue is hyperlinked directly to the original source material.
Produced by the Center for American Progress, 12/13/03 (www.americanprogress.org)
CLAIM vs. FACT: Health Care
DRUG COVERAGE
WHITE HOUSE CLAIM: "The historic legislation the President signed will create a modern Medicare system, providing seniors with prescription drug benefits."
FACT: "The new law gives private insurers the authority to ration access to drugs funded by Medicare. Beneficiaries will have to choose a drug insurer without knowing exactly what drugs that insurer will cover. Premiums will be higher in areas with older or sicker seniors." - American Progress Fellow Jeanne Lambrew, 12/4/03
FACT: "The Congressional Budget Office projects that 2.7 million retirees are expected to lose the drug coverage they currently receive through their former because their employers will drop such coverage when the Medicare drug benefit becomes available." - Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 12/11/03
FACT: "[T]he insurance plan would provide little relief for about 3 million people with moderate assets and incomes near the poverty level and would cost seniors with drug expenses under $835 a year more than they currently spend." - Boston Globe, 11/18/03
FACT: "A substantial number of the 6.4 million low-income Medicare beneficiaries who also are eligible for Medicaid and currently receive prescription drug coverage through Medicaid would be made worse off under the Medicare conference agreement." - Center of Budget and Policy Priorities Report, 11/21/03
FACT: "The Congressional Budget Office estimates about 2.7 million seniors could lose benefits that may be more generous than those that will be offered under Medicare." -USA Today, 11/25/03
DRUG COSTS
WHITE HOUSE CLAIM: "Beneficiaries who lack coverage will cut their yearly drug costs roughly in half, in exchange for an approximately $35 monthly premium. The more than one-third of seniors with low incomes will be eligible for even greater drug savings, paying as little as $1 per prescription."
FACT: "nder the new plan, seniors in the middle income quintile will pay an average of $1,650 a year in out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs in 2006. This figure is nearly 60 percent more than they paid in 2000, even after adjusting for inflation. Expenses are projected to continue to rise so that by 2013 middle-income seniors will be paying more than two and a half times as much for prescription drugs (adjusting for inflation) as they did in 2000." - Ctr. for Economic and Policy Research, 12/04/03
HEALTH SAVINGS ACCOUNTS
WHITE HOUSE CLAIM: "The historic Medicare legislation that the President signed included a provision establishing Health Savings Accounts (HSAs)...These HSAs will allow more Americans to save for health care needs, and will allow more small businesses to help workers secure health coverage."
FACT: The creation of "Health Care Savings Accounts" provides an "incentive to shift more costs to workers, who may be asked to 'match' their employer's contribution to a HSA with its high deductibles and high co-payments." Urban Institute economist Len Burman said HSAs will become "a boon to the healthy and wealthy and a bane" to older, sicker co-workers left to confront higher costs and premiums in traditional health plans. - Scripps Howard News, Scripps Howard, 12/3/03
FACT: According to major studies conducted in the past by RAND, the Urban Institute, and the American Academy of Actuaries, "premiums for comprehensive, employer-based coverage could more than double if such accounts became widespread." - CBPP, 11/18/03
Please note, text underlined in blue is hyperlinked directly to the original source material.
CLAIM vs. FACT: Economy/Deficits/Taxes
ECONOMY
WHITE HOUSE CLAIM: "President Bush's economic leadership is producing positive results."
FACT: "More than 2.2 million jobs have been lost since Bush took office. Bush is still on pace to be the first President since Herbert Hoover to have a net job loss over his four year term." - BLS Data
FACT: In July 2003, the Counsel of Economic Advisors predicted that the President's latest round of tax cuts would produce 1,530,000 jobs would be created in the first five months. In fact, only 271,000 jobs were created over those five months for a cumulative shortfall of 1,259,000 jobs. - Economic Policy Institute
FACT: "Twenty five major American cities saw a 19% increase in the need for emergency food last year alone." - UK Guardian, 11/3/03
FACT: "New jobs cre
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