Opinion Editorials, November 2003, www.aljazeerah.info
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Israeli daily aggression on the Palestinian people
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Bush's Economy: The Long, Hard Slog ... For the "Little People"
Emily B. Watson
Al-Jazeerah, 11/10/03
We the People" are being swindled so viciously and ruthlessly by the Bush regime, the worst "administration" in our nation's history ... that the public are "numbed-down" as well as "dumbed-down", as to the horrific consequences that face us, in the "not-so-distant" future.
Bush's economic fiasco is going to be the long, hard slog, that middle-class America will be forced to cope with ... The lower-income, middle-income and fixed-income retirees must bear the entire burden of Bush's insane $560 Billion record-level deficit ... and the looming national debt, rising at the highest rate since the Great Depression. Bush has destroyed over 3.2 million jobs and the unemployment rate is still close to 9 million, despite a minor increase in some jobs (approx. 200,000) in October.
The Bush Regime, their war-profiteers, "corporate-take-all" rapists, and robber-barons-- all of whom serve the corrupt and anti-American plutocrats in charge of the American oligarchy-- are making out like bandits ... they've been awarded the largest "welfare-for-the-rich" boondoggles, tax loopholes & tax cuts, in our nation's history ... Rising prices, escalating fuel costs, and, slashed services won't put a dent in their obscenely lavish life-styles ... The burden will be borne by the "little people".
In the Doctrine According to the "All for Me, and Me for Me" Bushies: "Only the 'little people' pay taxes & bear burdens'"!
Why isn't there a "Pre-emptive War" on POVERTY?
In "Economy: The Long, Hard Slog" on the Center for American Progress web-site at centerforamericanprogress.org:
"There was moderately good news this morning on the job front, as the latest employment report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that after three years of consistent job loss, the month of October saw the growth of 126,000 jobs. But don’t pop that proverbial champagne yet; there’s still a tough road ahead. [i]According to the BLS, the unemployment rate was essentially unchanged, as was the "number of unemployed persons, 8.8 million." And the "hard-hit manufacturing sector" actually lost another 24,000 jobs in October, making it "the 37th consecutive month of declines in that area."[/i] Even if the country continues to add jobs at the rate it did during the month of October, by the end of President Bush's term, the economy still will have lost about a million jobs, making [b]Bush the first president since Herbert Hoover to be at the helm of a country that actually had fewer jobs at the end of a four-year term than at the beginning[/b]. Just to get the country ba! ck to pre-Bush Administration levels, the economy would have to create 220,000 jobs per month for the next year.
[b]EVEN THOSE WORKING FEEL THE BITE[/b]: The American employment situation may be tough even if you're one of the lucky employed. Overall, wage income is down. The Economic Policy Institute reports "[i]Real wage and salary income declined by 1.2% between the start of the last recession (March, 2001) and the most recent months of data (August, 2003). That decline is the worst performance at this stage since 1959[/i]." And Lou Dobbs reports that, as workers continue their "[b]long, hard slog back into the workforce," it's not to the same standard of living they remember from before[/b]. "The people who have jobs are simply working more...Since companies began shedding jobs during the recent economic downturn, employees who remained behind are working more in order to avoid being the next victims of a cutback."
[b]THE BIG PICTURE[/b]: The news of 7.2% growth last quarter came with this sobering chaser: [b]The price the country is paying for this growth is astronomical, and the benefits are disproportionately aimed at the wealthy.[/b] Robert Kuttner this week writes there are two main problems with the economy: "[b]First, the benefits of the growth are not trickling down. Second, a high growth rate built on Bush's policies is unsustainable[/b]." Running a big deficit is one way to jumpstart a sluggish economy, and "if this were just a one-year stimulus program with a lot of aid to cities, states and the jobless, that would be about good policy. But [b]Bush's deficit was generated not to stimulate short-run demand or to keep public services flowing during a recession, but to cut taxes - most emphatically for America's wealthiest - and to slash social spending[/b]." (Citizens For Tax Justice reports that [b]over half of the Bush tax cuts will go to the richest 5% of Americans, wh! ile the bottom 60% of taxpayers see a paltry 7.8%, averaging less than $100 a year[/b].) Kuttner adds real growth won't result from "the unbalanced fiscal policy of the Bush Administration -[i] big, permanent deficits based on tax cuts for the rich coupled with starvation of public services[/i]."
[b]THE BIG PICTURE, PART DEUX[/b]: Brookings economist Peter Orszag in the New Republic continues the one-two punch on that theme, charging the the tax cuts and spending changes just don't give Americans the bang for their buck. The independent economic research firm economy.com estimates that only 0.9% of the 7.2% growth last quarter could be linked to the 2003 Bush tax cut. [i]Even if this were doubled and accounted for even $30 billion of the increase in annualized GDP, that's a "pretty bad deal," considering economists peg the cost of the tax cuts at close to "$1 trillion over ten years[/i]." Sums up Orszag: "If we wanted $30 billion in additional demand, we should have been able to get it for well under $1 trillion. For example, more state fiscal relief or increases in homeland security investments would have been much more cost effective."
[b]STATES OF CRISIS[/b]: Although there was some economic recovery on the national level, this week saw states are still facing severe fiscal crises, slashing programs and raising taxes in an effort to survive. A memo by Center for American Progress fellow Gene Sperling charges, "state fiscal conditions will be a drag on economic growth," as Goldman-Sachs estimates, “The overall fiscal impulse from the government sector is likely to turn restrictive in the second half of 2004. State and local governments will still be exerting fiscal restraint – probably around $20-$25 billion." Five cash-strapped states - Alabama, Colorado, Florida, Montana and Utah - have been forced "to freeze enrollment in their children's health insurance program (CHIP)" leaving uninsured kids out in the cold. South Carolina forecast Wednesday that it will likely have a gap of $631 million in its budget next year, meaning across-the-board cuts in 15% of programs, which likely means "layoffs for sta! te employees and tax increases." Schools in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota are getting property-tax funds from a recent referendum, state school funding has been frozen and they still face massive cuts in programs."
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| Earth, a planet hungry for peace |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03). |
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