The new Republican plan to balance the budget:
Cut programs that help poor people.
No really. That's their brilliant plan. Oh, and also something about drilling for oil in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Yeah, not sure so much where
that part came from.
Read on for the full article.
Readers may remember way back to right before President Bush took office, in 1999. The economic situation was
stellar. The
largest surplus in history (at least 115 Bln) had been achieved, and left intact for the next incoming President. In fact, projections said, if things were to continue on track, this trend might lead to a mind-blowing
1 trillion dollar surplus over a decade. Wow. That sure would have been neat. Just think what we could have done with that kind of money. The outgoing Presidential Administration suggested that it would have paid off the
National Debt. Personally I would have lobbied for a more humanistic combination of increased funding of social services, increases in foreign aid,
and paying off the National Debt.
But as we all know, Bush took office, 9/11 happened (too bad we didn't have the unconstitutional spying programs we have now which would have prevented 9/11
according to Cheney- don't even bother looking for facts to back up his suggestion).
And we all know what happened to the economy. But let's give it a quick review:
With more than one term under its belt, the Bush Administration
failed to create a single net job in the private sector, year over year. There have been small gains in
governmental job openings- ironic perhaps considering that Bush first campaigned on the platform of rolling back the supposedly bloated "big government" Clinton era governmental levels- in fact Bush actually expanded the government.
Bush said tax cuts for the wealthy would be a good strategy to help the economy. Well, we all know
that didn't work.
Bush created not only largest National Debt in history, but also added the
more that any President previously had to it- over than 2 Trillion dollars since 2001.
Year after year of detrimental government budgets either viewed as ineffectual or negative to the economy. This year, Republican-controlled Congress is trying to balance the federal budget. Did I mention the
what the National Debt is these days? Anyways, here's their plan.
Cut programs that help poor people.
No really. That's their brilliant plan. Oh, and also
drilling for oil in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Yeah, not sure so much where
that part came from.
Medicaid is
gonna see cuts (almost 5 billion dollars worth), if congress gets its way. No, I said
Medicaid, not Medicare. Medicaid is the one that provides at least some (though not enough)
health care for poor people.
Oh- you actually
did mean Medicare. Yeah
that one's getting budget cuts too.
I bet you can guess what else was under the ax of rich Republican lawmakers. Something called Welfare. Back in the 90s, Republican politicians were bent on reforming Welfare. Another program you might have heard of that helps poor people. Now they're satisfied just to
simply cut funding. I guess its not worth bothering you care about poor people anymore.
At least substantial funding for troops in Iraq was passed (as long as they're gonna be there, they might as well get funding needed to keep them alive...er... somewhat safe... er... well, maybe next year they'll finally get
that supplemental Humvee armor they were promised a year ago).
Originally posted at The Daily Background.com