by Tom Wheat
Feb. 2001
"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few."--Madison--
The president's address to congress contained many empty slogans and promises. First and foremost in American minds was his promise to reduce taxes, by capping the tax rate at 33% for the wealthiest of Americans, and lowering the tax rate for the lower and middle classes, from 15% to 10%. He also promised that this proposal would not harm social security or the economy. He could not be more wrong. Secondly he promised an aggresive national defense and a national missile defense shield. His missile defense shield has numerous failings and is discussed near the bottom of this editorial.
Now back to taxes.
Bush has projected that the tax cut will cost 1.6 trillion dollars. In reality his tax proposal will cost 2 trillion dollars. The tax proposal relies on a 10 year economic forecast. As economic experts in Washington have said it is impossible to predict how the economy will be in 10 years, let alone can anyone supply a reliable 10 year economic forecast. This along with his other agendas, including increased Defense spending in the short term will have exceeded the budget surpluses accrued over the last eight years, and he will be forced to spend money from the social security trust fund. Over the long term it will result in an increasing deficit, and increasing inflation.
This tax cut proposal is preposterous, in that it will only benefit those making over 500,000 dollars a year and others, including the wealthiest 10% of our population especially if the estate tax and marriage taxes are repealed. For example if you are single and make 500,000 dollars a year your tax rebate is $23,621. If you make 60,000 dollars a year, you recieve a rebate of $752. If you make minimum wage, (something which Bush will never increase,) the amount of taxes one will have to pay will be about 300 dollars less than what one paid in the previous year. In his speech he indirectly gave credit to Clinton by acknowledging that in "almost" the last ten years the government accrued a surplus. Now Bush will take credit for spending that surplus.
In justifying the estate tax repeal Bush used the analogy of the farmer attempting to pass on his farm to his son and how this embodied some sort of innate indivisable principle of America, of a father passing a legacy to his son. What he failed to mention is that the porkbarrelling projects involved in agricultural subsidies is a huge area that his administration will not dare to touch, because if you look at all the states that voted for Bush they are all in the farm belt, with the exception of his eastern power bases in conneticut and New hampshire. Yet if you also consider this important fact that when this country was founded, 90% of the economy was engaged in agriculture, now it is only about 10% of the population. Farmers make up a very small portion of the population, and have the oppurtunity to pay agricultural type wages often below minimum wage in some cases involving migrant laborers, and benefit extremley from the aforementioned generous subsidies package allotted to them by the federal government.
Can there then be any other reason for repealing these taxes, since if you consider that he has already decreased their taxes to a cap of at most 1/3 of their annual income, then would not the repeal of the estate tax mean that an even greater reduction was taking place since taxes on these estates are around 40%. Even some of the wealthiest people in America such as Warren Buffet, and Bill Gates Sr., and Jr., have actually come out against the repealment of the estate tax. They cite as their reasons that it will cause huge budget shortfalls and that the effect on the economy will be disasterous.
Here again it seems Bush is relying on a common formula innate to his ideology, 'trickle-down economics.' He thinks that the wealthy will then have an incentive to further invest their wealth into the american economy. Well then consider current trends, such as the industrial flight of corporations from American shores to countries such as Mexico, and China. One need only look to the current state of our domestic auto industry as it pertains to NAFTA,(originally championed by George Bush Sr.,) or to the depletion of the manufacturing base in America, and the increase in the manufacturing base in China, including an approximate 80 billion dollar trade deficit with China.
The majority of the wealthy people in america voted for Bush. He had the largest amount of campaign contributions than any other candidate, somewhere in the neighborhood of a 100 million dollars. Isn't it only fitting then, that in the current state of American politics, soft money dictates national policy. Now consider the ironies of the following statements.
Now, he also spoke of missile defence. In regards to his National defense plan his missile defense plan will result in greater nuclear arms proliferation throughout the world. START II will never be ratified by the Russians or the Chinese, and it will provoke them to not only increase their own arsenals, but also give them an incentive to supply further nuclear arms long range capabilities, to North Korea, Iran and Syria. The Chinese already supplied Pakistan with the technology they needed to go Nuclear, as leverage against India in their struggle to dominate Asia.
North Korea's Taepodong I missile already can reach Japan, provoking the Japanese to protest for nuclear parity as well. Its Taepodong II has been suggested by intelligence analysts as already capable of hitting targets from Alaska through California. Now the North Koreans will have even more missiles capable of reaching us with Chinese and Russian support.
China recieved its Neutron Bomb through the export of supercomputers begining in the early 80's, under Reagan facillitating a liberal export control policy, a pattern that continued into the 90's and later was exposed to the media through the security lapses at Los Alamos Nuclear laboratories.
Do not these statements of fact belly the umpaseant of Bush's belligerant unilateral stance a method that has distinguished itself by one systemic failure after another. For instance in regards to liberal free world trade and elimination of export controls under the rubric of corporate economic global consolidation under Bush-Reagan Junta patronage created China's neutron bomb, along with OSama bin laden and Saddam Hussein. So Bush's foreign policy has in reality compromised our national security, while appearing through the guise of free trade Americanisim and terrorist attack neccessitating more foreign interventions to prop up W's stock portfolio.
If the Syrians, and Iranians get nuclear weapons then all out nuclear war will break out between them and Israel. Do we really want semi autonomous clan fiefdoms and chieftans with the propensity for political and economic fragmentation to possess weapons of mass destruction creating an expanded nuclear arms market. Like for instance provide Hezbollah or Hamas, or how about even the fragments of the Mujahadeen with nuclear weapons, so that Osama bin Laden can also participate in our demise. Sounds farfetched, but is it really. However, that's where we are headed.
We refused to pass the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1996, due to a Democrat turncoat named Senator Byrd from WV, and as such the ABM treaty of START III, that followed came to nothing as well, since START II has yet to be passed. The idea of the "Shield," is so full of holes, it is analagous to a leaky pot trying to hold water.
Consider this:
The missile defense plan cannot defend against multiple ICBM launches, nor can it defend against possible launches or deployments of "killer satillites," satellites that can jam ground based interceptors, as well as those satillites used in tracking missile trajectories. Furthermore the missile defense plan cannot defend against the use of MIRVS, or any other nuclear missile with multiple war heads. Sounds like the SDI-STAR WARS dejavu--flashback to George Bush Sr., and Ronald Reagan. How many billions of dollars was spent on that program? How many more billions of dollars will be spent on provoking war with Asia, while we arm China with our annually increasing trade deficit.
Overall Bush's speech delivers only slogans and empty promises. What state of the world will we have left our children to look upon, but the fire of war and nuclear holocaust, just so a few rich people in the world can get a substantial tax cut.