posted on January 14, 2002 11:58:52 PM new
resident Bush took a sharp right turn in policy soon after his inauguration, surprising a country that heard a carefully crafted message of moderate governance during the campaign.
He's picked some strange battles early in his administration, prompting an outcry from everyone ranging from liberal Democrats to moderate Republicans. It's getting harder every
day to remember all of the truly mystifying policies the Bush administration is pursuing, so the Wage Slave Journal offers this scorecard to help you keep track of all of the evil
deeds Bush commits and, more important, to provide a record for your perusal when November 2004 rolls around. Be sure to bookmark this page; something tells us we'll need to
update it often. And if we miss some dastardly deed, email us to tell us what we overlooked.
posted on January 15, 2002 06:24:08 AM new
Wonderful link!
But I disagree with the rating system. Every evil deed listed deserves five black hearts. For example, ignoring poor people in this country leaving them without food, shelter or medical care is a five "heart evil". Just this morning I heard that in our area mental hospitals will be closing, adding to those people sleeping on the street. This local problem will be reflected across the country because medicaid rates are too low and states cannot fund the entire bill.
As unemployment grows, and the gap between wages, income, and the cost of housing increases more people will need assistance.
Shame on the Bush administration. Tax breaks for the rich can not be a top priority while people are sleeping on the street.
posted on January 15, 2002 09:56:55 AM new
Ohhh, give me a break!
It's amazing how George has transformed the whole world in just a few months. Even more amazing is how when the pendulum swings the other way periodically and there is a Democratic administration, years go by and still there is not enough time to undo these great evils. Ahhh, the Republican fairy wand is indeed more powerful.
The "homeless" problem is not caused by the pressure of jackboots on the necks of the oppressed.
Most of these people are mentally ill. They live in a carboard box because they like cardboard boxes. Years ago they used to round these people up and put them in shelters and feed them. Then a judge declared these people have rights. Ed Koch has written many times about the frustration of dealing with the homeless situation.
"It's amazing how George has transformed the whole world in just a few months"
It's amazing and incredibly evil.
I don't agree that "most" homeless people are crazy. But even if we accept your supposition as fact, human beings, some crazy and some sane, are living in cardboard boxes. These people die in their boxes on the streets of Washington DC because they are without heat.
This is happening while Bush gives a tax cut to the rich.
there are things you can "believe" and there are things that are fact. The liberal press like to portray the avg homeless person as Joe the guy that worked for the evil corp for 20 years then got laid off and took Abigail and the 2 little ones to the street. Mayor Koch had police pick up people living in train stations and roadway overpasses and take them to shelters but was ordered by the courts to stop this because these people had rights and you couldn't just pick them up.
By the same token, mental patients were discovered to have rights in the 70's and the mental hospitals were emptied, increasing the homeless AND the mental health problems.
You can't have it both ways. An incapacitated person cannot be both free and a ward of the state at the same time.
posted on January 15, 2002 11:53:27 AM new
PRESIDENT CLINTON ANNOUNCES $1 BILLION TO HELP THE HOMELESS
Largest aid package in history for homeless will go to 2,600 programs throughout the U.S.
If you read these links, you will find that his help was successful. Nothing is perfect and we can't abandon a problem because it's "frustrating".
posted on January 15, 2002 12:07:18 PM new
an excerpt from that article...
WASHINGTON - "During his last holiday address to the nation, President Clinton today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development will award more than $1 billion in grants to help homeless individuals and families obtain housing and receive the support services they need to get off the streets and become self-sufficient.
The grants represent the largest amount of homeless assistance in U.S. history, and will go to state and local governments and non-profit organizations in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam to fund more than 2,600 programs designed to end homelessness. More than 200,000 individuals are expected to be helped by the awards.
"Since President Clinton took office in 1993, HUD has invested nearly $6 billion in programs to help the homeless - more than four times as much as was spent from 1987 to 1993," HUD Secretary Andrew Cuomo said. "This Administration has made a real difference in the lives of our most vulnerable citizens, those who have not benefited from this nation's great economy. These grants will be a great boost to the organizations dedicated to helping break the cycle of homelessness."
Two types of grants will be awarded:
Continuum of Care grants, which provide transitional and permanent housing, and such support services as job training, health care, mental health counseling, substance abuse treatment, child care and living skills training.
Emergency Shelter Grants, which help convert buildings into homeless shelters, and fund certain related social services and homeless prevention activities.
The lion's share of the funding, more than $895 million, will be awarded as Continuum of Care grants. These grants provide a flexible framework for each community to use in helping its homeless. The general components are outreach and assessment, emergency shelter, transitional housing, permanent housing and permanent supportive housing.
The Continuum of Care initiative, which was developed by Cuomo when he was an Assistant Secretary at HUD, is the centerpiece of the federal policy on homelessness and is the recipient of Harvard University and the Ford Foundation's prestigious Innovations in American Government Award.
The Continuum of Care grants, first awarded in 1994, have helped more than 400,000 homeless individuals get housing and jobs. Currently, about 6,000 community programs receive the funding. The initiative has been so successful that it has leveraged nearly $2 billion in additional public and private resources, and nearly 2,900 U.S. cities and counties have developed their own program modeled after HUD's.
Nearly $29 million in Continuum of Care grants will go to existing Shelter Plus Care projects, which help pay rent and provide permanent housing for disabled homeless individuals. In addition to shelter, homeless people with disabilities often need medical care and other social services to live independently. Grantees must match the rental assistance with support services that are at least equal in value to the amount of HUD's rental assistance.
"The Continuum of Care initiative has made real and important progress toward creating local systems which truly meet the full range of needs of homeless people from street outreach to permanent housing," said Nan Roman, executive director, National Alliance to End Homelessness. "The Clinton Administration, Secretary Cuomo and HUD are to be commended for the creation of this program which has changed the lives of millions of Americans for the better."
The second type of awards, Emergency Shelter Grants, are formula grants to states and local communities throughout the U.S. to improve the quality and number of emergency homeless shelters. The funds may also be used for covering a shelter's operating expenses, essential services involving employment, health, drug abuse and education, or homelessness prevention activities. Some $150 million of the funding awarded today will be as Emergency Shelter Grants.
Cuomo noted that homeless women with children and veterans will each be served by about 1,350 of the funded projects, 68 of which are targeted for veterans.
According to a recent HUD study, the majority of homeless families who receive housing and support services ultimately find an improved living situation. Homelessness: Programs and People They Serve found that 76 percent of homeless persons living in families and 60 percent of homeless individuals ceased being homeless after completion of the assistance program.
"Homelessness is too often a faceless problem," Cuomo said. "We can't stand by and let this happen. Intervention is the key to turning their lives around."
As part of its on-going effort to highlight the plight of the nation's homeless and encourage more Americans to become involved in helping the homeless become self-sufficient, HUD recently launched its Put a Face on Homelessness media campaign.
The centerpiece of the campaign is public service announcements featuring more than 20 celebrities including Martin Sheen, Glenn Close, Kevin Kline, William Baldwin, Christi Brinkley, Whoopi Goldberg, Mandy Patinkin, Sarah Jessica Parker and Ray Romano.
The ABC, CBS and NBC television networks and the Lifetime Channel have agreed to broadcast the PSAs which encourage the public to call HUD at 1-800-HUD-1010 or to log onto HUD's website at www.hud.gov/december.html to get information on ways they can help homeless people in their community."
posted on January 15, 2002 12:16:06 PM new"discovered to have rights in the 70's and the mental hospitals were emptied"
That's so inaccurate that it can only be trolling.
Here in CA gov. Ronnie Reagan helped the homeless by slashing state budgets for the operation of state mental hospitals, including som for the criminally insane, so drstically that many closed their doors and divied the patients out amonst a bunch of highly touted 'halfway houses'. People who were medically unable to decide whether they liked cardboard boxes were placed in them while they awaited beds in the uderfunded houses. The halfway house program went on to become one of th most lucrative means for common homeowners to rip off the state coffers by cramming as many patients as possible at hundreds of dollars a head into squalid and decrepit houses which they were able to purchase from agencies which had slated them for destruction and where they fed them a daily portion of garbage barely able to meet minimum subsistance requirements.
posted on January 15, 2002 12:34:08 PM new
kraftdinner
that was a sacastic assessment. It was for those who simulaneously say George is the dumbest person on the planet and yet has managed to form an inner and outer evil empire the likes of which may soon control the world.
Same crap about anyone who is ever elected.
Oh good! George Sr lost the election, Gov Clinon will save us. Ahhh, oops, he didn't.
On and On and On. A government like ours is a huge ship and no matter who thinks old so an so is going to get up there and cut that wheel left and right, the whole thing is only going to move with the precision of a glacier.
posted on January 15, 2002 12:59:35 PM new"that was a sacastic assessment."...thank Gawd desquirrel. I thought you had flipped out on us.
Of course there's going to be something "wrong" with every elected government official. Personally, I think George W. has some very redeeming qualities, but outside of this war, his policies are outdated and one-sided imo. The war is his cover for now.
(terrible spelling)
[ edited by kraftdinner on Jan 15, 2002 01:28 PM ]
posted on January 15, 2002 02:26:45 PM new
Same old stuff I've talked about before Helen. You can be a good person, but a bad President. Look at Reagan. I think he's a decent person, but was a VERY BAD president. I wish Clinton could have stayed in office forever. I thought he was a great President.
posted on January 15, 2002 03:52:58 PM new
Thaks for that li8nk, KRS. However, it barely covers the true depths to which Bush's Evil Empire stretches over. For instance, no mention of the rigged Missle Defense tests, no mention of Bush's acitve invovement in campaigning to raise oil prices for OPEC just prior tpo the the last presidential campagin, and so on. I suppose it would end up being a full-scale encyclopedia by 2004 and who would want to read it?
They are already grooming Colin Powell as the next Presidential candidate: Dumbya was never meant to win in the first place and almost everyone in Amerrica reviles him. Oh, except for a few whinners ...
posted on January 15, 2002 10:19:53 PM new
That was probably true before the 911 attacks. Since then, seems even the most diehard political ignoramus knows the name of the President.
Funny note: for once the American people actually do have a reason for not knowing who the vice-President is! Cheney only makes appearances whenever they can risk it from his life support machinery.
posted on January 16, 2002 08:27:31 AM new"The I like Bush percentage is much higher after 9/11 than before."
Of course it is, silly! Most Americans want or wanted to rally around the government in time of national need! It's an old trick that the Romans used to predict and employ to their best ability. It is such a well-known phenomena, that only uneducated boors have no inkling whatsoever that this approval result is a perfectly natural one.
Also, as the 'crisis' is deemed to have expired, the approval historically swings heavily into the negative ... and just in time for the elections too!
sp.
[ edited by Borillar on Jan 16, 2002 08:28 AM ]
posted on January 16, 2002 08:54:44 AM new
Borillar
My comment had nothing to do with the dynamics of public opinion polls but with your statement that MOST people "revile" George W.
In the future maybe you could clarify responses as to whether they are statements or desires. A person could read that desire and take it as a belief and think the person was divorced from reality.
"silly" was not meant as an attack, more of a "Ah, come on!"
posted on January 16, 2002 09:07:59 PM new
Do most people in America revile GeeDubya? Not according to the latest informal polling by CNN. He and the GOP still have a 51% likeability rating; whereas the Democrats have only a 43% likeability rating.
BALONEY!
While many people do indeed support the office of the President, they do not necessarily care for the man in the office itself. And the poll questions are worded so silly that you get the Office opinion for the Man.
I can tell you that here in Oregon, GeeDubya isn't much welcome.
posted on January 16, 2002 11:13:57 PM new
Borillar
To quote RR:
"there you go again!"
The Gallup pole (1/14) says the approval rating is 83% with a statistical error of +/- 3% down 1% from the previous week.
I realize the guy in the next treehouse agrees with you, but it's a short block.
Oh, and while I approve of the handling of the "war", I'm not particularly a Bush fan either. He has not been in office long enough to be either reviled or annointed.
posted on January 17, 2002 10:42:55 AM new"The Gallup pole (1/14) says the approval rating is 83% with a statistical error of +/- 3% down 1% from the previous week."
Excatly what I was saying, also in another thread as well. The 83% approve of the job that he's doing in office because:
1) There's a war on.
2) When asked seperately about his handling of domestic affairs, his rating slips down to less than half that number. See item #1.
3) Voters who are so ignorant of the political process pick a political party at random and support it -- like a football team. They root for it, support it, and have drunken parties based upon who wins or looses. Democracy in action - hrumphf!
"He has not been in office long enough to be either reviled or annointed."
Tell that to Republicans who were slamming and attacking Clinton long before he even took office. They were trashing his record by the minute for eight long years. There's no time limit for conservatives, so why shouldn't that apply to everyone?
Also, as I mentioned earlier in this thread, that link that KRS inititally provided is woefully inadequate. Bush did not wait a full year to get nasty -- he did a smash-and-bash job the instant that he was sworn into the office. If he can't wait a year to get nasty, then there's no reason for us to wait either IMO.
