"I Call You My Base"

[DeeDeeNY]

"I Call You My Base"
Froma Harrop

President Bush's new budget will top $3 trillion. It envisions massive deficits for fiscal years 2008 and 2009 — nearly matching the record in 2004, when the federal budget went $412 billion into the hole.

The average American might properly ask, "Shouldn't we at least have something to show for all this?" Even the basics are missing — for example, health coverage for all children, a serious effort against global warming, bridges that don't fall down. Where has the money gone?

David Cay Johnston provides some answers in his angry and brilliant book, "Free Lunch." An ace investigative reporter, Johnston explains: "From those leaves in the park to textbooks to highway bridge maintenance to food safety inspections, money is dwindling because so much has been diverted to the already rich through giveaways, tax breaks and a host of subsidies that range from the explicit to the deeply hidden."

......

Johnston recalls Bush's famous remarks to a white-tie crowd at the Waldorf-Astoria during his 2000 campaign. Referring to his audience as the "haves and have mores," he said that "some people call you the elite. I call you my base."

Bush gave the "base" some very big tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. The cuts were supposed to boost the economy and probably helped, but they never generated enough revenue to pay for themselves. When higher collections helped lower the 2005 and 2006 deficits, the administration credited tax-cutting magic. Most economists disagreed, citing an upswing in the business cycle, bolstered by a housing bubble.

http://www.creators.com/opinion/froma-harrop/-i-call-you-my-base.html