Post Scripts: More (and more) hot air

What will President Bush confront the people of America with next? We didn’t have to wait long for his newest adventure – proposing a space station on the Moon in preparation for a future launch to Mars. Of course this is exciting, but it doesn’t seem to matter to the White House the nation is facing a fiscal crisis down the road due to a questionable war, plus the burdens imposed on the budget by questionable tax cuts.

Money for space exploration could be better spent by helping states meet their fiscal responsibilities: funding highway construction, boosting education and aiding the poor.

I am told most Americans today are middle-class with the lower half making less than $50,000 a year. Since the year 2001, 1.5 million Americans have slipped to the poverty line, which is about $18,000 a year for a family of four. Thus 55 million citizens could be at risk of hunger, including 2.9 million children.

This appears not to affect Bush policy a great deal. After all, ordinary hard-working citizens have been falling behind financially for some time. According to the Congressional Budget Office, incomes of the middle class from 1979 to 1997 rose from $41,000 to $45,000. The incomes of families in the top one percent rose from $420,000 to $1.016 million!

As for taxes during this period, corporations paid an average of 25 percent of the federal tax burden. In 2000 they paid only 10 percent, and by 2001 only 7 percent. Not too long ago corporations paid a rate of 47 percent –today it is 35 percent. Returning to the old rate, and closing numerous loopholes, would increase the government’s tax revenues by $110 billion.

"Don’t hold your breath," as my mother used to say.

U.S. corporations using tax shelters on off-shore islands costs our government $70 billion a year. This will continue because George Bush is in the pocket of corporate interests and they are in his pocket because of the enormous tax cuts he gave " big business."

How bad is it? I read just recently the partners in J.P. Morgan, the huge New York banking firm, have paid no income tax for two years. The newspapers covered the story well but discovered no tax laws were broken. Irked at the criticism the firm received, the son of the firm’s founder had this to say: "Congress should know how to levy taxes and if it doesn’t know how to collect them, than a man is a fool to pay the taxes. If stupid mistakes are made, it is up to Congress to rectify them, not the taxpayer." I suppose he’s right if you do not have any respect for honesty or fairness.

There are many more sickening examples of tax evasion, such as in Bermuda where nearly a hundred U.S. millionaires filed returns saying they did not owe anything. Nearly 14,000 tax returns were filed by persons who made over $200,000 a year, but paid taxes at a rate well under 20 percent.

We’re stuck with a president who took us into a questionable war; gave big tax breaks to the super wealthy, continues to run up a huge federal deficit for future taxpayers to solve, and eighty percent of the nation’s wealth is now in the hands of 10 percent of the people. There are things Bush says he means and things he says to stay in office. If his initiative benefits the oil business or keeps the rich from paying taxes, it’s okay. If it is a major environmental or social initiative, or a bit more aid to the poor, all we get is hot air.