Life in the Third Layer

If there is any consistent identifying feature of Republican doctrine prior to the advent of the Bush Dynasty, it is fiscal responsibility — balancing the budget, knowing where the dollars are coming from, holding on to our credit-worthy status, being a good solid banker.
George W. Bush is not a Republican in this sense. He just talks about fiscal responsibility. Really he is leading his Republican Congress to give him the farm. (That would be the one they wouldn’t have to sell to pay the inheritance tax. So much better to just give it to him up front.) The children of this country are mortgaged for the next three generations by the fiscal policies of the Bush administration. John at Thudfactor cites the Bush fakery on the $87 billion for operations in Iraq:

Bush threatened a veto of this bill. The version that passed had no legislation to indicate where that money would come from. Kerry’s vote against this bill was a vote for fiscal responsibility.
Fiscal health is our number one weapon in any war. If we have no money and no one trusts our credit, how will we field an army?
Kerry supported the bill when it was responsible, but Bush demanded a bill that was irresponsible.

John Kerry didn’t “flip-flop.” He just read the fine print and voted for responsible leadership. Apparently, “flip-flop” is Bush-speak for thinking about anything long enough to develop any insight. Bush worked his double-speak magic, which is pure and simple obfuscation, clouding the issue while he picked our pockets as Howard Gleckman explained in BusinessWeek Online, September 10, 2003:

There’s just one problem. While Bush and Congress are fighting over every dollar, they’re going to pretend the $87 billion in Iraq money doesn’t count as part of the discretionary budget ceiling, even though every thing else the Pentagon does is included.
This is an accounting gimmick that would shame even Enron. “We will hold down spending,” Bush and GOP leaders on Capitol Hill will say. But next to that boast will be a little imaginary asterisk that says, “For everything, that is, but Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, a fistful of trust funds, and the war in Iraq.” In truth, the government will spend more than $1.3 trillion next year — close to twice the discretionary-spending target — on stuff that doesn’t count in Washington’s debates over fiscal responsibility.

No bleeding heart liberal public assistance policy in the history of the world has been so blatantly dismissive of fiscal responsibility. When you compare the cost of the Iraq war to the cost of social programs, the magnitude of the deception and waste becomes apparent. Add to this cost the fact that the Iraq war has undone all of the good effects of negotiation and containment and empowered the recruitment of terrorists. This war has increased terrorism by increasing injustice, poverty, and fear, which are the root causes of terrorism. The world is not safer. Read a newspaper once a week.
Who is still supporting George W. Bush? Are there that many people who cannot see that he is not a Republican any more than he is a Democrat? He is not a statesman at all. He demonstrates no sense of responsibility even for his own outcomes, much less the conservative Republican fiscal responsibility and committment to good management. He does not serve the universal values of peace and justice. If he gets one vote in November that vote will be have to be based upon ignorance.

Andrew Kang Bartlett, Associate for National Hunger Concerns,
Presbyterian Hunger Program in Louisville, KY sent me this note in response to my Wal-Mart item:

We all get lots of information, news and analysis about the election and voting from mainstream sources, but rarely do we get to reflect on voting based on our Christian values. “Christian Principles in an Election Year,” from the National Council of Churches USA, gives 10 Christian principles and a study guide to use with your congregation. Here is the link: http://www.ncccusa.org/news/04christianprinciplesstory.html

Elizabeth Dole wants to “defend” marriage between a man and a woman. Who is attacking that?

“Marriage between a man and a woman isn’t something Republicans invented, but it is something Republicans will defend,” she said. “We believe in a culture that respects all life … the frail elderly, the infirm and those not yet born. Protecting life isn’t something Republicans invented. But it is something Republicans will defend.”

She reads different newspapers than those that come my way, otherwise she would know that you would protect more frail elderly, infirm, and unborn people by expanding access to medical care than you would by overturning Roe v. Wade. And the Republican who is running for President in 2004 does not respect all life. His record on the death penalty proves that.
People who reduce the primary values of human life to buzzwords for political reasons damage the concepts of marriage and family. They seduce voters into thinking that they are voting for family values when in reality a vote for George W. Bush is a vote for a President who has taken jobs and medical insurance away from thousands of families. His bunch will continue to push more families and children into poverty if we are fools enough to let them have another four years to work their magic.

Reason of the Day to
Vote for John Kerry and John Edwards
I have been reading the 25-or-so page Congressional Report on Wal-Mart’s Labor Record by Rep. George Miller, February 16, 2004:

In January 2004, the New York Times reported on an internal Wal-Mart audit which found “extensive violations of child-labor laws and state regulations requiring time for breaks and meals. One week of time records from 25,000 employees in July 2000 found 1,371 instances of minors working too late, during school hours, or for too many hours in a day. There were 60,767 missed breaks and 15,705 lost meal times.

According to the New York Times report: “Verette Richardson, a former Wal-Mart cashier in Kansas City, Mo., said it was sometimes so hard to get a break that some cashiers urinated on themselves. Bella Blaubergs, a diabetic who worked at a Wal-Mart in Washington State, said she sometimes nearly fainted from low blood sugar because managers often would not give breaks.

A store manager in Kentucky told the New York Times that, after the audit was issued, he received no word from company executives to try harder to cut down on violations: “There was no follow-up to that audit, there was nothing sent out I was aware of saying, ‘We’re bad. We screwed up. This is the remedy we’re going to follow to correct the situation.”

I don’t remember when the fair Labor Standards Act was passed, but I believe it was in 1938.
International observers at our elections, our wage-earners treated like slaves, our children dropping out of high school to go to work, the L-curve — we are becoming a model third-world society. Quick, somebody vote for a Democrat!

Anybody who has been in first grade knows that first the bully hits you, then he yells to get everybody’s attention so you can’t hit him back:

This is the second time in recent days that an individual associated with the Bush re-election effort has acknowledged working with Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

It is difficult to move significant quantities of money from one pocket to another. Say, for example, you are the United States and you have a few thousand moldy million lying around, and you (or at least your leadership) wants to give it to good buddy Halliburton. People would look askance if you just handed it over directly. So you go find a small country that is ruled by an evil dictator, who is also an infidel. It helps that this evil infidel dictator is already killing his people pretty much on the whim of the day. You start a war, move in, and take out the evil dictator. Because he is already killing people, your actions fit well with the principles of compassionate conservatism, putting a lot of them out of their misery more quickly and liberating the rest. Also, because he is an infidel, you look like a crusader. Then you set up a new government that looks wise and experienced, but which, in fact, has no understanding of western-style cost accounting. You give them the money, and you let Halliburton send them invoices. They pay the invoices, money changes pockets, and you are a hero.