June 09, 2008

IMPEACH BUSH

IMPEACH CHENEY

MCCAIN NO FRIEND TO VETERANS

Republicans love to use the military to further their own political ambitions. George W. Bush has used the military as a backdrop constantly, even though he has been busily slashing veterans benefits. John McCain is no better. He loves to talk about his Vietnam service and take his tough military stance on the war in Iraq, but his record is consistently anti-veteran. This article by Edward Humes is at www.madison.com:

From 2004 to 2006, the Disabled Veterans of America gave him annual scores ranging from 50 percent to 20 percent on supporting the group's legislative priorities. The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America gave him a grade of D in its most recent analysis of voting records. The American Legion says he is dead wrong on the GI Bill, as does the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

When Sen. Barack Obama (who has averaged an 86 percent rating from the Disabled Veterans of America) criticized McCain on the GI Bill, the Arizona senator angrily suggested that Obama's status as a nonveteran rendered his opinions on military matters worthless (this standard would also discount the opinions of 85 percent of American men, 98.8 percent of American women and two-thirds of Congress). Then he invited a look at his own record by asserting, "I take a back seat to no one in my affection, respect and devotion to veterans."

THE IMMORAL LEVEL OF INEQUALITY

Thanks to the policies of people like George W. Bush the gap between the rich and the poor in the United States is at the levels that existed during the infamous Gilded Age. This is no small matter. Money or the lack of money dictates almost everything about your life in this society. The kind of food you eat, the kind of housing you can afford, your transportation needs, your medical care, and the kind of education that is affordable all come down to money. We have seen policies put in place that reward the already wealthy while taking from working class Americans. This column by
Katrina Vanden Heuvel is at www.thenation.com:

The good news is that Democratic presidential nominee, Senator Barack Obama, quickly spoke out against the decision by Democrats not to take on the loophole after more than twenty lobbying firms worked to preserve it. At the time the campaign issued a statement saying, "If there was ever a doubt that Washington lobbyists don't actually represent real Americans, it's the fact that they stopped leaders of both parties from requiring elite investment firms to pay their fair share of taxes, even as middle-class families struggle to pay theirs. When I'm President, the American people won't have to spend record amounts on lobbying to get their voice heard in Washington. I will close tax loopholes for big corporations...."

But it will take a lot more than closing an obscene tax loophole to reverse thirty years of tax cuts for the rich, union-busting, and deregulation that promoted corporate interests at the expense of consumers--all of this bankrolled by conservatives and corporations to instill blind faith in the market as a magic elixir that can solve any problem.

The result is that we now live in a Second Gilded Age. (And The Nation will hold a name Name Our Epoch! contest starting next week. The winner will be selected by our all-star progressive panel of judges--historian Howard Zinn, journalist Barbara Ehrenreich and novelist Walter Mosley.) The richest 1 percent of Americans currently hold wealth worth nearly $16.8 trillion, $2 trillion more than the bottom 90 percent. According to the Center for American Progress , since 1979 the average income for the bottom half of American households has grown by 6 percent. In contrast, the top 1 percent of earners have seen their incomes rise by 229 percent during that same period.