Forbes: Capitalist Tool

[Theophylact]

... or Liberal Media??

One day after proposing bigger budgets for defense and homeland security, the White House on Tuesday released a list of the 128 programs it wants gutted, from education equity for women to combating alcohol abuse, a problem President George W. Bush faced himself.

While calling on Congress to rein in domestic spending to address a record budget deficit, Bush has made education reform a key plank in his campaign for reelection in November and announced in last month's State of the Union address a $300 million program to help released prisoners re-integrate into society. His wife, Laura, has traveled the world promoting literacy.

But according to newly released details about his fiscal 2005 budget, Bush would scrap programs to improve writing skills, teach economics and foreign languages, and promote literacy in prison.

A program that provides residents of poor areas access to computers and training would also get the ax, along with recreation programs for the disabled, aid for migrant farm workers , and an initiative to promote "educational equity" for girls and women.

A public advocate of physical fitness and job training, Bush would do away with recreational programs for people with disabilities, deferring to states to pick up the slack. Olympic scholarships, arts in education, and a program for native Alaskans and Hawaiians called "exchanges with historic whaling and trading partners" would also be scrapped.

It took the White House more than 24 hours to provide the complete list of the 65 program terminations and 63 major program reductions included in Bush budget for the fiscal year that begins in October. It was unclear how much of Bush's spending plan will win congressional approval as there was already growing opposition within both parties.

The White House said many of the targeted programs were either redundant or out-of-date.

"Being responsible with the people's money not only means funding key national priorities and controlling other spending, as the president's budget does, but also terminating or reducing programs that are wasteful, duplicative or fail to produce results," said a spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget.

Bush's budget calls for increasing defense and homeland security funding by 7 percent and nearly 10 percent respectively. Otherwise, Bush proposes to freeze growth in discretionary spending to begin reducing this year's record $521 billion budget deficit.

Bush's "termination" list includes a small program that documents the history of the "Underground Railroad," which helped many African Americans escape slave states prior to and during the Civil War.

He also would end a $30 million alcohol abuse reduction program which, the White House says, "supports innovative and effective programs to reduce alcohol abuse in secondary schools." The White House said grants to states could provide similar help.

During a visit to a Dallas church in October, Bush, a devout Christian, alluded to his own decision to quit drinking in 1986 when he was 40.

"A lot of times, the best way to help the addict, a person who is stuck on drugs and alcohol, is to change their heart. See, if you change their heart then they change their behavior. I know," he said.

[whitebeard21]

During a visit to a Dallas church in October, Bush, a devout Christian, alluded to his own decision to quit drinking in 1986 when he was 40.

1988 (2 years later) - "You f*******son of a b****. I saw what you wrote. We're not going to forget this." A drunken George W., storming into a Mexican diner in Dallas, and approaching Al Hunt (Wall Street Journal editor). Al was dining with his wife and 4 year old son, when Dubya interrupted cursing for several minutes in front of everyone. (edited for vulgarity)

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/graphic...h/bush_tsg.mov