Bush Deliberately Bankrupting America?

[Donutboy 0]

The following is from Truthout.org. Not, as it seems, from Greenspan

Greenspan Testimony Highlights Bush Plan for Deliberate Federal Bankruptcy

Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan's Feb. 25 testimony to the House Budget Committee provided an unintentionally candid look at the Bush administration's deliberate fiscal policy of bankrupting the federal government to justify a sweeping program of privatization.

     During his February 25 testimony before the House Budget Committee, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan generated sensational national headlines by recommending that President Bush's $1.5 trillion in tax cuts be made permanent while Social Security and Medicare benefits be dramatically cut to achieve long term deficit reduction and a balanced budget.

     In spite of the media furor and across the board condemnation by the remaining Democratic presidential candidates, there should be no reason for surprise at Greenspan's remarks. In his capacity as shill for the Bush administration, the Chairman's recommendations make perfect sense, as long as one is not foolish enough to believe the window dressing about a long term balanced budget. Mr. Greenspan is laying the groundwork for a second Bush administration, not a balanced budget. His remarks, and most of the economic policies of the Bush administration, can only be understood against the backdrop of the little remarked right wing agenda of deliberate federal bankruptcy.

     From the first months of the Bush administration, when their initial breathtaking tax cuts were presented to Congress, it has been obvious that the explicit goal of this administration is to bankrupt the federal government to justify a sweeping program of privatization. Pursuing federal bankruptcy is a deliberate policy.

     This administration's pursuit of bankruptcy as deliberate policy had to be extraordinarily bold from day one because public programs such as Social Security were so extraordinarily solvent into the distant future, and the underlying strength and diversity of the U.S. economy was sufficient to keep them that way if spending priorities were not radically altered. The events of 9/11 provided the perfect cover for pursuing federal bankruptcy in the guise of an open ended war on terror.

     We know that the constituency for the Bush economic program consists of the military-industrial complex and the wealthy. The Bush administration's policies of massive defense spending and unprecedented tax cuts for upper income brackets reward both constituencies, while the short term economic lift from more than $450 billion in defense spending (dubbed "Military Keynesianism" by Robert Pollin of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and others) is part of a conscious election year strategy to give at least the appearance of economic recovery. But the longer term goal of these policies, cutting revenues while increasing spending into the indefinite future, is still federal insolvency.

     A massive federal deficit, it is hoped, will justify to the public the wholesale privatization of social security, medicare, prisons, schools, water, the Federal Aviation Administration, Amtrak, welfare services, public power utilities, the federal postal service, etc., etc., etc. Visit the websites of any of the major right wing think tanks from which this administration has drawn its highest officials, and you will find entire sections of archived documents and books arguing the case for privatization of nearly the entire public sector.

     From the American Enterprise Institute to the Heritage Foundation, from the Hoover Institution to the Cato Institute to the Reason Foundation, privatization has been a prime objective of the right for the past 25 years. The National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) even provides a handy list of potential targets for privatization.

     There are plenty of examples of the Bush administration's attempts to push privatization, such as their effort to change federal funding rules for public water utilities, making such federal funding contingent upon proof that the utilities each have a privatization plan in place. Amtrak, Social Security and public schools are explicitly in their sights. Education factories such as Edison Schools are the preferred Republican solution to education.

     The public, so far, is resistant to an explicit agenda of mass privatization. But if Bush and his corporate backers were to be given a second term, pursuit of this privatization agenda would be unfettered, with the bulging Social Security trust fund at the top of the list among prospective candidate programs. That is what Mr. Greenspan is really signaling with his Congressional testimony in favor of permanent tax cuts today. The pursuit of federal insolvency increases the financial pressure on all elements of the public sector, making the argument for privatization theoretically more compelling. Indeed, Bush and company would read their election to a second term as a tacit mandate for their privatization agenda, and the consequences for the commonweal would be devastating.

     Only Rep. Dennis Kucinich and former Vermont Governor Howard Dean have talked explicitly about the Republican privatization agenda in this election year. Dean has noted that the Bush economic model for the U.S. is Argentina, although the sophistication of that analogy is lost on the average voter. Kucinich has talked about the dangers of privatizing water.

     Privatization deserves to be front and center in this country's political debate, and privatization's history of miserable failure needs to be placed squarely on the table in plain language for the electorate to consider. The history of failed privatization schemes includes doomed water privatization projects in South America and the U.S. (Atlanta is the poster child), rail privatization in Britain, and school and prison privatization in the U.S.

     The Bush administration's pursuit of federal bankruptcy on behalf of their largest corporate sponsors, who will be the primary beneficiaries of privatization, represents an all out assault on the idea that the federal government should represent the commonweal and act as a wise custodian of our collective resources. We see instead a vision of a global battlefield where scarce resources go to the strongest and to those who already have. Mr. Greenspan's comments today tell us that this world view extends to the domestic front and will continue and accelerate in a second Bush administration.

     We would do well to heed the underlying message and put an end to the Bush administration's Imperial misadventures abroad and fiscal malfeasance at home.

[MDM4AU 338]

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[DKW 86 7,899]

The tax cuts were not that huge. They are at present temporary.

They were necessary to get the economy rolling again.

Social Security will imlpode because it is like all Ponzi schemes, it will fail in time.

[Tiger in Spain 0]

Hey Donut, do you ever have an original idea anymore? You consistently bombard us with quoted articles from questionable sources, yet rarely ever put your own $.02 in to let us know you have the ability to think for yourself. Don't just carpet bomb us with misguided opinions of others......misguide us yourself brother, and provide us a link to your news sources........<cough>MoveOn.org<cough>.

[Donutboy 0]

The tax cuts were not that huge. They are at present temporary.

They were necessary to get the economy rolling again.

Social Security will imlpode because it is like all Ponzi schemes, it will fail in time.

Social Security was solvent for at least another 25-30 years. Bush promised in the 2000 campaign to add $2.5 trillion dollars in additional funds to Social Security to make it solvent into the forseeable future. Instead, he's borrowed heavily from the Social Security surpluses to help fund his tax cuts and his nation-building. The first tax cuts were NOT given to spur economic growth. They were given as a reward for Clinton's efforts in building a budget surplus. Bush promised that he could cut taxes and maintain a budget surplus. Many of you believed him and some still do. He now promises to cut the budget deficit in half by 2008. Gee, who'd elect a president whose campaign promise is to run 1/2 trillion$$ deficit for the next few years and then only overspend by a 1/4 trillion$$ a year? I guess the old saying attributed to Barnum & Bailey is true. There's a sucker born every minute.

[Donutboy 0]

Hey Donut, do you ever have an original idea anymore? You consistently bombard us with quoted articles from questionable sources, yet rarely ever put your own $.02 in to let us know you have the ability to think for yourself. Don't just carpet bomb us with misguided opinions of others......misguide us yourself brother, and provide us a link to your news sources........<cough>MoveOn.org<cough>.

Here's a novel idea TIS. If you don't like my posts, don't read them!!

[Tiger in Spain 0]

Here's a novel idea TIS. If you don't like my posts, don't read them!!

Ouch!

All I'm asking for is your honest opinion and a source for your material.

[DKW 86 7,899]

It's just that with 9-11, almost everything changed. We had Clinton's economy in the toilet and a war to fight. Sorry if you refuse to look at the other part of the picture.

[Donutboy 0]

Here's a novel idea TIS. If you don't like my posts, don't read them!!

Ouch!

All I'm asking for is your honest opinion and a source for your material.

I believe that I always include a source. Usually the first line in my posts is a link to the article!!

[Donutboy 0]

It's just that with 9-11, almost everything changed. We had Clinton's economy in the toilet and a war to fight. Sorry if you refuse to look at the other part of the picture.

How long are you going to keep blaming 9-11 for every ill that this country is suffering due to the Bush family's ineptness? We were in recession before 9-11. 9-11 certainly exacerbated it but it's been 2 1/2 years. Our country's current malaise can no longer be blamed on 9-11. 9-11 isn't the reason we're running a budget deficit in excess of 1/2 trillion$$ a year. 9-11 isn't the reason that the Bush tax cuts are still not producing sufficient jobs for our nation's workers. 9-11 isn't the reason we're stuck in wars all over the world..... Well, except for Afghanistan!!

I'm afraid that the Bush adminstration plan to blame everything on 9-11 is going to backfire on him in November.

[DKW 86 7,899]

I'm afraid that the Bush adminstration plan to blame everything on 9-11 is going to backfire on him in November.

I wonder if the Dem plan to blame every ill on earth on GWB wont backfire on them in November. I never said Bush was perfect, but the guy has had huge problems to deal with since the first day in office.

[Tiger Al 0]

I'm afraid that the Bush adminstration plan to blame everything on 9-11 is going to backfire on him in November.

I am wonder if the Dem plan to blame every ill on earth on GWB wont backfire on them in November. I never said Bush was perfect, but the guy has had huge problems to deal with since the first day in office.

David, you weren't paying much attention (not surprising). Before 2002, most moderates in this country, Democrat and republican alike, had no real problems with Bush, myself included, outside of the ones you normally run into when legislating a country. Once the midterms were over and the Senate had tipped to the republicans, he seemed to rip his 'compassionate conservative' mask off and we were introduced to the neo-con Mr. Hyde.

As I've said before, I voted for him in 2000 based on what he campaigned on. In retrospect, that is the worst vote I've ever cast and I'm wondering how many Floridians feel 100 times worse about theirs. My vote didn't matter in Alabama but theirs sure did. You know the old Gomerism: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. He's long ago stopped fooling me.

One thing he did say that was true, although not in the way it was meant, and that he's a uniter. Thanks to Bush, I'll NEVER EVER EVER vote for a republican again. If there isn't a Democrat I like, then I just won't vote for that office. If Bush is the precursor for what your party is becoming, then I'll always be able to find a better Democrat.

[Ranger12 53]

Spin, spin, spin. Try to keep spending it anyway you want, but the fact remains that the economy is improving! You can't argue with the numbers, but I be dang if you liberals keep trying to twist them. When it comes to social security, sometimes the right thing to do is not alwasy the most popular. If Bush would have wanted to increase Social Security spending, you liberals would have been crying about "where is the money going to come from". Regardless of what Bush does, liberals hate him and have some kind of personal vendatta against him. So, quit trying to cover it up with your bs spin.

[Tiger Al 0]

Spin, spin, spin. Try to keep spending it anyway you want, but the fact remains that the economy is improving! You can't argue with the numbers, but I be dang if you liberals keep trying to twist them. When it comes to social security, sometimes the right thing to do is not alwasy the most popular. If Bush would have wanted to increase Social Security spending, you liberals would have been crying about "where is the money going to come from". Regardless of what Bush does, liberals hate him and have some kind of personal vendatta against him. So, quit trying to cover it up with your bs spin.

ranger, has it ever occurred to you that people's hatred of Bush comes from HIS policies?

I keep seeing over and over and over the statements like you made about bs spin and hatred of Bush as if to say that we hate him personally and so we disagree with his actions as a result of that. I'm sure there are those who have hated him from his campaign to this day and there would be nothing he could do to make them happy. Same thing when Clinton was in. They represent a small minority.

For most of us, it is his policies that have fostered an extreme dissatisfaction of him, or if you like, 'hatred.'

I'm sorry if that doesn't fit into your little compartmentalized notion of who dislikes him and why.

[Bottomfeeder 244]

The neocon and the neoliberals were all cast from the same mold.

The Interminable Goldberg

"...the present batch of neocon-neoliberal imperialists, who find hypocritical circumlocutions for pushing around other countries and for denying their sovereignty."

"Murray Rothbard and Robert Higgs were both right to stress a general incompatibility between limited constitutional government and expanding empires. Imperial crusades make it harder to counteract consolidated managerial government and push forward the cumulative process by which a once self-restrained regime based on checks and balances is turned into a unified engine of foreign expansion."

[Tigermike 3,717]

ranger, has it ever occurred to you that people's hatred of Bush comes from HIS policies?

That is total you and the rest of the dems hate President Bush because your attempt at stealing an election failed! Your welcome. I'm sorry if that doesn't fit into your little compartmentalized notion of reality.