What We Were Told vs. What We Got

Do we really wan Four More Years of Shrub? Here are some good talking points the next time someone tells you they are voting Republican this election cycle:

 

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"We will reduce taxes, to recover the momentum of our economy and reward the effort and enterprise of working Americans."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush caves to steel industry's threat against retired workers.
· Bush delays reparations to cancer-stricken uranium miners.
· Bush bans workers' unions at Justice Department.
· Bush makes it easier for companies not to hire, or pay retirement packages for older workers.
· Bush kills rule allowing new parents to collect unemployment.
· Bush leaves unemployed workers with no benefits.
· Bush proposes to eliminate overtime for 8 million American workers.
· Bush kills Labor Department report on mass layoffs.
· Over 3 million Americans lost their jobs and that trend continues every month.
· Bush proposes worker permits to illegal aliens, who will take over 65 million dollars out of our economy each year, and millions of low-skilled American laborers out of work.
· Bush has set the all time record for home foreclosures in a twelve month period.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"We will defend our allies and our interests."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush creates military database of information on every American.
· Bush gives the military access to student's private, protected records.
· Bush blocks plans to upgrade nation's power grid

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"Today, we affirm a new commitment to live out our nation's promise through civility, courage, compassion and character; by confronting problems instead of passing them on to future generations."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush abandons programs to build more fuel efficient cars.
· Bush's war on terror is costing American's 1 billion dollars weekly, the highest federal deficit in U.S. history, to be paid for by our children and grandchildren.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"The grandest of these ideals is an unfolding American promise; that everyone belongs, that everyone deserves a chance, that no insignificant person was ever born."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush cuts federal program for women.
· Bush refuses to attend international conference on racism.
· Bush pushes for Constitutional amendment denying gays and lesbians the right to marry.
· Bush cuts White Office for Women's Initiatives and Outreach.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"The ambitions of some Americans are limited by failing schools. Together, we will reclaim America's schools, before ignorance and apathy claim more young lives."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush defunds "Reading is Fundamental"
· Bush cuts education for military dependents.
· Bush defunds "Teach for America."
· Bush cuts school lunch programs for children

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"In the quiet of American conscious, we know that deep, persistent poverty is unworthy of our nation's promise."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush delays energy assistance to the poor.
· Bush refuses to increase child care funding for welfare mothers.
· Bush tells welfare mothers to find husbands.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"Where there is suffering, there is duty."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush blocks agreement that would provide cheap drugs to the world's poor.
· Bush cuts pay for soldiers in Iraq.
· Bush dismisses needy military families by proposing cut in military retirement benefits.
· Bush closes down VA medical centers.
· Bush ends program that notifies veterans of the benefits they are entitled to.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"Government has great responsibilities, for public safety..."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush cuts police budgets nationwide.

AND WE WERE TOLD
"...public health."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush cuts health programs for uninsured.
· Bush attacks privacy of American's medical records.
· Bush blocks the EPA from issuing a warning about asbestos.
· Bush asks court to seal records on vaccines and autism.
· Bush refuses to enforce the Clean Air Act.
· Bush blocks respected scientists from commission on lead standards and appoints lobbyist from the lead industry instead.
· Bush eases nursing home regulations.

AND WE WERE TOLD...
"...and for civil rights."

AND WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush blocks human rights cases from reaching U.S. courts.
· Bush orders the destruction of the Public Information Act.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"Our public interest depends on private character..and basic fairness"

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush makes it easier for criminals to get federal contracts (i.e., Enron, Haliburton, etc.)
· Bush rejects federal request to review Karl Rove's finances.
· Bush discontinues budget reports to state governors.
· Bush undermines Justice Dept's suits against polluting companies.
· Bush shields missile defense plans from congressional oversight.
· Bush dismisses report from his own administration on global warming.
· Bush pushes through corporate tax breaks without Congressional approval.
· Bush gives oil companies in Iraq blanket immunity from lawsuits.
· Bush awards no-bid contracts to Halliburton and other high donating companies.

WHAT WE WERE TOLD:
"America, at it's best, is a place where personal responsibility is valued and expected."

WHAT WE GOT:
· Bush cuts funding to the very programs he used in his photo ops.
· Bush has presided over the highest gasoline prices in U.S. history.
· Bush has set the all time record for most days spent on vacation in any one-year period of any U.S. president.
· Bush sold the September 11 picture to the highest bidder for a Republican fundraiser.
· Bush used funds designated for alternative energy to pay for printing his energy policy.

A Great Photo...

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Army Spc. Alan Seufert plays taps during a Memorial Day observance at the post cemetery at Fort Riley, Kan. Monday, May 31, 2004. The program made special mention of the 37 soldiers stationed at the base who have died since the beginning of the war in Iraq. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

A New Way To Post Means A Better Blog!

Friends,

 

Blogger.com, the software that powers this blog, has now made it possible for blog editors to post via email, which means that I'll **finally** be able to keep this blog updated like it should be!

 

Toward that end, here is an interesting story from the Associated Press regarding polls in the Presidential Election.

 

Keep checking out the blog for more great stuff now that it's easier for me to post!

War Casualties...

(Thanks to Daily Kos for this).

 

The following is a list of casualties from all wars from 1775 to the present.

 

This afternoon, I posted a list of Texas casualties from the Iraq war over at Free State Standard, which you can view there.

 

Here is the list. It's mind-numbing.

 

The Revolutionary War ): Combat – 4,435/Other (disease, etc.) – 6,188

War of ): Combat – 2,260

Indian Wars ): Combat – 1,000 (estimate)

Mexican War ): Combat – 1,733/Other – 11,550

War Between the States: Combat – 214,938/Other – 283,394 [Civil War statistics are notoriously disputed – some claim as many as 750,000 soldiers died on both sides.]

Spanish-American War ): Combat – 385/Other – 2,061

World War I ): Combat – 53,402/Other – 63,114

World War II ): Combat – 291,577/Other - 113,842

Korean War ): Combat – 33,686/Other – 2,830

Vietnam War ): Combat – 47,410/Other – 10,788

Gulf War ): Combat – 148/Other – 235

Iraq War ): Combat/Other - 814

Even Republicans Call For More Oversight Of Bush

Friends,

 

This is from the New York Times. Thought you might find it interesting.

 

CONGRESSIONAL MEMO:
Even Republicans Call For More Oversight Of Bush

WASHINGTON, May 30--Members of Congress have a proud tradition of asking
witnesses tough questions at famous inquiries like the Watergate and
Iran-contra hearings. Now the Iraqi prison abuse scandal has some lawmakers
asking a hard question of themselves: What doesn't Congress know and why
doesn't it know it?

The disclosures about the treatment of detainees, coupled with complaints
from some quarters about the Bush administration's handling of
anti-terrorism money, have ignited a debate over whether Congress is keeping
a close enough eye on the White House and staying adequately informed on
developments in Iraq.

Democrats, not surprisingly, think much more scrutiny is necessary and have
been complaining for months that the Republican leadership in Congress is
refusing to hold its allies in the Bush administration accountable on a
range of subjects. Now even some Republicans say they worry that Congress is
abdicating its oversight responsibility.

"I believe our failure to do proper oversight has hurt our country and the
administration," said Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut
Republican who traveled to Iraq to get a view of the situation outside
administration control. "Maybe they wouldn't have gotten into some of this
trouble had our oversight been better."

The issue burst into thein recent days as the Senate and House took
starkly different approaches to the prison abuse inquiry, with the Senate
holding a series of high-profile hearings and the House just one public
session. House Republican leaders criticized the Senate for grandstanding on
the issue, and the House rejected a Democratic push for a broader inquiry.

Frustrated Democratic leaders sent a letter to Speaker J. Dennis Hastert
last Monday, demanding that he direct the relevant committees to pursue the
abuse issue.

"There does not seem to be an investigative agenda, and a work plan for
fulfilling that agenda, in place anywhere in the House," said the letter,
signed by the Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi of California; the Democratic
whip, Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland; and the caucus chairman, Robert Menendez
of New Jersey. "We believe that the House will be derelict in its
institutional oversight responsibilities unless this situation changes soon."

Mr. Hastert dismisses the rising criticism of the House's oversight record
as a partisan effort to build a political case against the Republican
leadership. He said the majority had actively kept abreast of developments
in Iraq, though it might not be conducting the "show trials" he said
Democrats would prefer.

"In Iraq, we have literally sent scores of members there to take a look and
see for themselves what is happening on a bipartisan basis," Mr. Hastert said.

Representative Duncan Hunter, the California Republican who is chairman of
the House Armed Services Committee, said Congress had given undue attention
to the abuse of prisoners. "Maybe we should cancel every piece of
Congressional business for the entire year so that the issue at Abu Ghraib
can be milked until the election," he said.

To other lawmakers and outside experts, the feud over how far to go in
examining the scandal is symptomatic of the deeper question of whether the
Republican Congress is being aggressive enough in monitoring the Bush
administration when their political fortunes are so closely linked.

"The Republican dominance of Congress and the White House has led to an
attitude of 'We can keep it within the fold; it is our team and our team
will understand us,' " said Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat who
sits on the Armed Services Committee.

Democrats and others say Congress should have looked more closely at the
Bush administration's failure to provide full estimates of the cost of the
new Medicare drug law and the leak of the identity of a covert C.I.A.
worker, among other matters.

"Party has trumped institutional responsibility," said Thomas E. Mann, a
senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "The sense of shared political
stakes bridging either end of Pennsylvania Avenue has overwhelmed any sense
of institutional responsibility."

Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, a Republican who has made himself a
thorn in the side of both Republican and Democratic administrations, says
Congress rarely does enough oversight. "And I believe that is whether you
have a Republican Congress versus a Republican president or a Democratic
Congress versus a Democratic president," Mr. Grassley said. He recalled that
Democrats had been all too eager to help him pursue wrongdoing in the
administrations of Ronald Reagan and the first George Bush, but that when he
kept at it in the Clinton era, "I lost the same allies."

Mr. Grassley pointed out that oversight can be tedious, unglamorous work,
and that it sometimes takes years to tease out problems buried deep in the
bureaucracy. Mr. Hastert acknowledged that Republicans were slow to acquire
the investigatory skills honed by Democrats during their 40-year dominance
of the House. Some say demands on the time of lawmakers and lack of
experienced staff have also contributed to diminished oversight.

Yet there have been serious efforts by some committees to pursue lines of
inquiry over Iraq - particularly in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
and its review of the upcoming transition of power, and in the House
Government Reform Committee, which explored reconstruction contracts in Iraq.

Even leading Republicans concede privately that the Bush administration
resists energetic oversight, an attitude Democrats say is reflected in the
administration's occasionally dismissive attitude toward lawmakers of both
parties. They point to the allegation in Bob Woodward's book "Plan of
Attack" that the Bush administration diverted $700 million in post-Sept. 11
money to secretly begin planning the war with Iraq. In the past, such a
charge could have led to a full-blown inquiry.

Congressional Republicans said the White House appeared to have acted within
the wide latitude it was given by Congress to handle the money. But the
disclosure about the movement of the money, when added to the fact that
lawmakers got no advance warning of the scope of the prison abuse before it
exploded into the news, seems to have stirred a more assertive attitude in some.

Besides the prospect of more Senate hearings on prison abuse, Republicans in
both the House and the Senate joined Democrats in insisting that the
additional $25 billion sought by the Bush administration for Iraq be much
more tightly controlled than the previous war allocations.

"We really do need to preserve the important role that Congress plays," said
Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, as the Armed Services Committee
examined the administration's request. "It is our duty."

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