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Last night, in a speech President Bush hyped as "sheer wisdom," the American people were treated to the same warmed-over ideas they have now heard for four years: ill-conceived domestic proposals, failed economic policies, and foreign policy rhetoric without any serious apologies for mistakes made. In many ways this is no surprise. As the Associated Press puts it, "An unpopular war and 1.1 million lost jobs are enough to kill a presidency, so President Bush tried Thursday night to make the election about something else."
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The president's biggest domestic policy proposals are ill-conceived and fiscally irresponsible. Bush's proposed domestic policies – privatizing Social Security, cutting taxes for the wealthy, and addressing healthcare – are wrong for America. His idea to privatize Social Security would hurt retirees and could cost $1 trillion over the next decade. His proposal to create Health Savings Accounts would likely drive up deductibles for American workers and swell the ranks of the uninsured. Achieving fiscal discipline is made all the more difficult by the conflict in Iraq and his budget-busting push to continue his tax cuts for the wealthy.
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President Bush has done little to address the myriad international challenges we face. According to the State Department, the number of significant terrorist attacks last year was at a 21-year high. Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar still haven't been captured, and the Bush administration has made it more difficult by shifting Special Forces out of Afghanistan. The war in Iraq has cost $144 billion, but polls now show that solid majorities of Americans think it increased the threat of terrorism and that the president doesn't have a clear plan for bringing it to a successful close.
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The president's speech was an indication that a second Bush term would simply be a continuation of the first. Although 60 percent of Americans believe the nation is headed in the wrong direction, the president still refuses to realize his policies aren't working. His economic policies have yet to have a positive impact on the labor market, have led to a reduction in real income for the average household over the last three years and have contributed to a loss of more than a million jobs since he took office. Forty-five million Americans lack healthcare – more than did four years ago – and 4.3 million have fallen into poverty since he was elected.
Daily Talking Points is a product of the American Progress Action Fund.
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Daily Talking Points is a product of the American Progress Action Fund. |
