Like Father, Like Son

It had to happen. Some thought it wouldn't. Oh, but it was prophesized. It runs in the family lying, cheating, and yes - reversing pledges not to raise taxes. A Bush tax hike (on the backs of the poor) sounds so retro-1992, doesn't it? Bush's "new and improved" economic team is about as improved as a prescription pain reliever that causes excruciating backaches and promotes swelling throughout the entire body. (Scott McClellan's FDA should be prepared to unveil one soon, no doubt accompanied by a report which claims hydrochloric acid makes a great salad dressing).

As I write this article, Bush's illiterate policy writers are sifting through Webster's dictionary for words that can be used to say "raise taxes on the poor" without actually using the words "raise", "taxes", or "poor." The minute they finish looking those up, along with all the other words that comprise those long, boring paragraphs known as "definitions" they will unveil Bush's economic agenda for 2003.

Since I already know the English language, I can provide a little glimpse into what they've got planned. They want to abolish the earned income tax credit. The earned income tax credit is that part of your tax form which prevents people earning under $30,000 (the majority of Americans) from being forced to choose between either paying rent or buying food in most metropolitan areas. In suburban or rural areas, it's the difference between affording the car necessary to get to work, or affording the home to return to after leaving work.

Parents earning over 30K beware you'll be affected by this too. You may be forced to let your kids live with you until they're your age, because even those college grads who are lucky enough to find a job in this economy won't be paid enough to afford to live on their own with or without roommates if Bush pushes this tax hike through congress.

Starting salaries for the entry level hover around 20K before taxes. Rents for studio apartments in cities hover around $700 a month in the most crime-plagued areas. Most kids won't even get entry-level corporate jobs- they'll have to settle for a part time cashier position at K-mart earning 10K before taxes.

You can forget about your kids paying off their own college loans, won't happen. If you think your kids will pay for their own health insurance once the earned income tax credit is repealed, think again. A shift of the tax burden to the poor will also shift all the expense burdens of recent college graduates completely onto the shoulders of their parents.

The earned income tax credit is the only thing standing between millions of people who get up every day to work for a living and a fate of homelessness which is usually followed by sickness, alcoholism, drug addiction, and death. If the earned income tax credit is repealed, there would be no purpose to work itself. If doing the right thing doesn't do anything right for someone, why would they bother doing it?

If those in the affected brackets cannot afford the rising costs of rent, electricity, transportation and food, they will not be able to live- at least not without government assistance. That will make welfare and social security more attractive than employment. Employers will be deeply bruised by this trend as they will see a shift from a surplus of applicants to a deficit of available labor. If companies are counting on the abolition of social services to motivate people to work for so little, while paying overwhelming taxes, they're crazy. When a country fails to provide opportunity to its people, the people move to another country.

Before those people move, however, they should attempt to vent their frustrations at the ballot box. Hopefully Bush's reprise of his father's about face on the "no new taxes" pledge (especially in a way that discriminates against those who are struggling the most, in the midst of a Bush-inflicted economic crisis) will provide America's working families with a rallying cry.

Working families and others hoping to restore the American Dream should register to vote now. So they can cast their ballots in the Democratic primary and choose a candidate who is willing to stage an uncompromising challenge to Bush's destructive agenda on economic, foreign policy, and domestic human rights issues.

This time around, there is no excuse for anyone to accuse Bush's challenger of being similar to him the challenger has not yet been selected. The upcoming primary election will thus be more important than the general election because it will determine whether the general election is worth voting in. It's now up to the people of America now to participate in the primary which will decide if America's working families have a voice in politics or not.

If Americans do not register as Democrats now,
the result will be the next Great Depression.

Recessions and depressions do not stem from uncontrollable economic statistics those statistics represent the actions of individual people. What is the TRUE definition of a depression? A decline in consumer spending? No, that's what the corporations want you to think. A decline in business investments? Who makes those investments but businesses? If that were true, businesses would invest during recessions in order to reverse the depression.

A depression only occurs when a group of corrupt people take over a government and use the government's resources to concentrate the bulk of the nation's money into the hands of themselves and a small group of their business colleagues. All the rest of the data reflects the effects those corrupt individuals' behavior has on society. That was what happened during the Great "Depression" and that is what the Bush Administration is trying to do again.

Money is made of paper. It is a real, physical object. It doesn't evaporate. It can accumulate in a individual person or group of people's hands, or it can flow throughout the population enabling everyone to live. Those are the only two things that ever happen to money, or any other physical resource. When the edge of a cliff falls off, the material it's comprised of still exists, it just breaks into pieces and eventually forms sediment elsewhere (redistribution). I know this as a former Wall Street professional.

The only thing necessary to avert or reverse a Depression is voter participation in the primary and general elections either as candidates, voters or both. I lived and breathed the data and discovered for myself how much that data depends on governmental decision making, much more than it does on consumer discretion. (For a much more detailed explanation see Kevin Phillips' "Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich")

Think your vote doesn't count? Wrong. It counts if you make it count. Think you can't run for office and defeat an incumbent, because the incumbent has too much corporate money? Wellstone did it, and you can continue his legacy. Think one person can't change the world? To that I laugh. All people in this world are but individuals and all that occurs in this world depends on the actions of individuals.

To America, I implore, you pick the candidates, you pick the winners, you pick the future of this nation. Politics affects you, and you affect politics. You decide if the system works or not because you decide the system when you decide whether or not to try and change the system. You decide how business is done in this nation with every product you buy or refuse to buy, with every election you vote in or refuse to vote in, and with every broadcast you watch or refuse to watch.

The time has come for every American to change the way business is done in Washington. Americans won't have to wait until 2004 to do that, either. The primaries are only a few months away. It's time for America to stand up and say "Read Our Lips."

The choice is yours, America.