Bush's Budget

The President submitted his budget to Congress yesterday, and it's full of the kind of easter eggs only a plutocrat could love.  Bush has asked to up the budgets for the war machine--even excluding the $80 billion he plans to ask for Iraq--while cutting back expenditures on farmers, families, and the poor.  Oh, and the tax cuts stay right where they are.  When Bush asks for sacrifice, he doesn't include ones that might affect major GOP donors.  As Bush says, it's "a budget that sets priorities."

Here they are:

What do you think--are these the right priorities?

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    Yes,

    These are absolutely the RIGHT priority. Hopefully, America will finally wake up and realize that the Republicans could care less about them. They only want to realize a goal of taking this country back to the Wild Wild West era. Yee Hah. Bush is simply a Republican that's too stupid to realize the political consequence of fully realizing the Republican ideology.

  • Jim (unverified)
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    My concern is that the GOP have developed such good spinmeisters and the Dems have become so weak and lacking in ideas that people will just buy this line of crap and say - "works for me"

  • Jason E. (unverified)
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    Go figure...the largest increaset goes to abstinence...if ONLY the GOP would put into practice that which it holds so dear!

  • iggi (unverified)
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    Mr. Bush always has our best interests in mind...i'm sure all that spending was going to waste anyway. god bless 'im.

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    The whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but this one reaaaaaaaaaaaally bothers me:

    Cutting $45 billion from Medicaid (that's the federal health plan for the poor)

    Medicaid is co-funded by the federal AND state governments. Medicaid is also responsible for caring for the elderly and infermed (i.e. nursing home care). The process is long and complicated but the end result will be the state picking up a bigger chunk of the bill (with what money?) and horrible living/end of life conditions for those who cannot afford nursing home care.

    And before anybody says that people should have planned in their retirement for such things, they should know that until the early 80s it wasn't an issue (also a long and complicated story that anyone who is dying to know may ask me about privately via e-mail), but since Medicare stopped allowing folks to hang out in the hospital until they die, nursing homes have come into play. Most of the people who rely on Medicaid to pay for their nursing home care didn't have time to factor the huge bills into their retirement plans. These people may have started out with quite a bit of money and assets but have been forced to spend them down in order to qualify for Medicaid. It's sad when it comes to that, but at least it's an option.

    It's sad... pathetic really... that the most affluent country on the planet doesn't give a sh*t about the elderly. We wouldn't have what we do if not for previous generations and the way we treat them is appalling. But what does Bush care? It's not like he'll be running again and besides, most of these people will be dead in four years anyway. Who really needs their vote.

  • Tom Civiletti (unverified)
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    Jason E.,

    Do you mean the GOP should stop f-ing everyone?

  • Tenskwatawa (unverified)
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    I reject the budget as even a topic to talk about, put a sock in it until we get done talking about charges of torture and war crimes up the chain of command to the Rumsfelds and Gonzalezes.

    Congress: Investigate this!

    When the budget does get talked about, I propose the oppo-Bushers (our side) collect all our individual pains of cuts and dys-priorities, (health care, education, corruption clean-up, e.g.), on one side of the scale, and weigh them all in discussion against the military spending waste. After all, WMDs was a lie and Osama was a lie and danger to us was a lie, and it's mainly a lie that we need so many bombs and mercenaries to protect us. Especially if we stopped invading other countries and sticking our nose in other people's business. Social security means national security. And right now, word is, society ain't feeling too 'secure.' Spend our tax money on people's social needs first and then we can feel, and can be, a lot more 'secure' as a nation. Social security doesn't come before national security. Social security is national security. Make every damn dime in the Pentagon explain itself. Make the media go over it for us -- boycott them if they don't.

    I think every cut listed in the post in percentages, if the numbers were put in actual dollars, could all be put back with just the $8 billion that Brown & Root, or KBR, or Halliburton, or one of them -- or each of them! -- somehow "lost" last week. We gave them our tax money -- eight billion-with-a-'B' dollars. And they lost it. Sorry, that ain't good enough, Congress. Get it back. Wash it over the scorched earth that these flaming neo-con devils leave behind.

    Period. That's it. Gordon gag-me-with-a-golf-club Smith rehearsed lines with Liars Larson today, saying: "We have to choose: subsidized Bonneville rates OR a balanced budget? Subsidized Amtrak OR a balanced budget?" That's their intended 'framing.' BZZZZT. Tilt. Reject. The choice, Gordon, (Liars calls him 'Gordon'), the CHOICE is: living -- you know, people, society... OR bullets. Now you show and tell us why we need bullets, Gordo, because it don't look like we do. Not as much as we need life. Which is a good idea, Sinister Smith -- got any?

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  • Tenskwatawa (unverified)
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    A global snapshot, for starters: Military Gobbles Funds Earmarked for Social Development, by Thalif Deen: ... Werner Fornos, president of the Washington-based Population Institute, told IPS that it is ”a global scandal that the funding estimated to be spent on the military and the war on terrorism is nearly 20 times higher than the amount currently allocated for economic and social development worldwide.”

    It is incredibly shortsighted to short-change programs for improving lives by diverting resources to programs of death and destruction, he said.

    ”The proliferation of poverty and hunger and the lack of health care, education and employment fuel the push factor of desperation and despair that, in turn, breeds alienation, discontent, rebellion, and terrorism,” Fornos said. ...

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  • Carol Hamilton (unverified)
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    ANd for frosting on the proverbial cake...the Bu$h budget imposes $5.3 billion in new, regressive taxes. (They are conveniently listed in table 18-3 on page 317 of the Analytic Perspectives supplement to the budget). The administration’s budget contains new taxes that will increase the price of a six-pack of beer, an airline ticket and prescription drugs for veterans. Meanwhile, the budget cuts funding for education, public health and environmental protection and includes $1.4 trillion in new tax cuts for the wealthy.

  • cab (unverified)
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    Its terrible to say, but I take a little plesure in this budget. American's are going to get what they voted for. A nation gets the leadership it deserves. At this point in history, its time to step back and just say Fck it and watch our nation implode. I'm one person who will be working my A off for the next few years to get out of dodge when the Sht its the fan. Whatever this administration does now is all on us.

  • myrln (unverified)
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    And look at the cuts in Veterans' benefits. Dumbya will send our kids (not his, tho') to war, but screw caring for them afterwards when they need help. That's somebody else's problem, not his. His MORAL preaching proves to be morally bankrupt when it comes to action and responsibility.

  • the prof (unverified)
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    Democrats underestimated Reagan in the 1980s, assuming he was a kindly old buffoon. Don't make the same mistake with Bush. He's anything but stupid, and he knows precisely what he's doing.

    And while he's dramatically reshaping government, we console ourselves that at least we're the smart ones.

  • (Show?)

    Ok, welcome to the new world order. What do we do about it? Other than "consoling ourselves that we're the smart ones" or bitching on blogs, I mean. Others have talked about the need for grassroots organizing in the face of the Republican gains--well, here's our call to arms, folks.

    We Democrats took a couple of months off to lick our wounds but it is time to come out swinging. So call the Oregon delegation--all of them--and tell them what you think about this budget. Write to local papers, and make it known that Bush's budget priorities are not your priorities. Call Lars and pick a fight, organize a protest, do whatever you gotta do, just don't take this crap lying down.

    Sitting back and watching the Republicans f*ck up the country isn't gonna get progressive leaders in power the next time round. It is a two-part process: pointing out the holes in the Bushie spin AND providing a viable alternative. If Dems sit back, the only thing that will happen is that more and more people will abandon the political process, figuring that there's nothing they can do to change it. Prove them wrong.

    I'm off to write my Congresspeople...

  • Michael (unverified)
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    One of the most expensive welfare programs in the world is the U.S. policy of defending other nations. We have spent in excess of $15 trillion since the end of WWII to keep our troops in other nations. Presently we have some 250,000 troops in 100 nations around the world. At some point in time they will be withdrawn. The qustion becomes under what circumstances will they be withdrawn? Will it be a planned withdrawall that allows our allies where or troops are stationed to fill the gap we leave, or will it be an rushed withdrawall creating a political vacuum? Neither the Republicans, nor the Democratic party seem to be able to face this problem. And in the meantime we American workers continue to fund the defense needs of our economic competitors. M. W.

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