Saturday, November 12, 2005
Press Release: House Dems lambast Bush budget
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Nancy Pelosi/Ed Takashima
November 12, 2005
House Dems: President’s Proposed Budget a Disaster for America
Catastrophic Impact on Military Families, Rural Americans, Seniors and Working Families
Washington, D.C. – House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi released the following statement from House Democrats in response to the President’s proposed budget:
The President’s proposed budget is a plan for disaster that would return us to Herbert Hoover’s America. The administration’s agenda betrays our men and women in uniform, abandons rural Americans, impoverishes seniors and systematically attacks working families. It increases our dependence on foreign oil, despoils America’s natural treasures, ends our national commitment to space exploration, ignores America’s infrastructure needs and fails to provide aid to the Gulf Coast to heal the ravages of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. We are, however, heartened by the Administration’s recognition that permanently extending its 2001 and 2003 tax cuts would be fiscally irresponsible and infeasible.
The Bush administration’s budget:
Betrays Military Families: At a time when our men and women in uniform are fighting around the world to protect America – and in a budget released on Veterans Day – the administration seeks to slash military health benefits by $5.2 billion by weakening military families’ health benefits and increasing medical costs for veterans. The latter move comes in a cut whose savings will come largely from reduced medical services for men and women who have served in our nation’s uniform.
Abandons Rural America: The administration’s budget would be a catastrophic blow to rural America. By eliminating the Essential Air Service program and slashing funding for long-distance AMTRAK routes that disproportionately service rural areas, it devastates a major transportation and economic link for many small towns and isolated communities. By privatizing the Tennessee Valley Authority Southeastern Power Administration, it opens the door for private power companies to price-gouge or abandon rural families and farmers. By eliminating the Appalachian Regional Commission, Denali Commission and Delta Regional Authority, it slashes education, job-creation and health care aid to some of the neediest and most isolated rural communities in America. By ending federal support for the Rural Community Advancement Program, it reduces economic assistance to rural communities in need. By reducing support for medical education, it will exacerbate the health care crisis caused by a shortage of rural medical practitioners.
Impoverishes Seniors: The administration’s proposals constitute nothing short of an attempt to destroy the Social Security system that has been America’s most effective program to eliminate poverty among our seniors. The administration drastically raises the retirement age and slashes cost-of-living adjustments for seniors living on a fixed income. It cuts spousal benefits in a move that punishes widows and widowers – especially damaging for seniors in single-income families. The administration also changes the computation period for benefits in a move that disproportionately harms parents to interrupt their careers to raise their families.
Attack on Working Families: The administration’s proposal undercuts efforts to keep American workers competitive in a global market, creates a hidden tax on the middle class, worsens the already-critical health care crisis and bizarrely withdraws support for children and students.
Attack on American Workers: By weakening anti-dumping laws, eliminating trade adjustment assistance for workers displaced by outsourcing and foreign competition and ending efforts to promote American businesses abroad, the administration tears down efforts to keep American workers and businesses competitive in a global market. By weakening prevailing-wage provisions for federal construction, it jeopardizes the quality of federal construction projects while driving down wages for skilled construction workers.
Hidden Tax on the Middle Class: By failing to address the serious flaws in the Alternative Minimum Tax, the administration by default is imposing what will soon become a serious hidden tax on the middle class. Designed in 1969 to tax 155 wealthy taxpayers, the AMT will by 2010 increase taxes for almost 31 million middle-class taxpayers, with disproportionately higher burdens on married couples and families with children.
Exacerbating the Health Care Crisis: The administration’s budget makes numerous cuts to the medical safety net that have the combined effect of restricting patients’ access to medical services and shifting costs from the federal government to patients and local governments.
Shortchanging Children and Students: In some of its most inexplicable cuts, the administration proposes to eliminate funding for anti-violence and anti-drug efforts in schools and communities as well as anti-drug advertising – effectively giving up on attempts to deter our children from illegal drug use. The administration also plans to reduce funding for child nutrition programs in schools and drastically cuts our efforts to make college affordable for all children by decimating the federal student loan program – eliminating subsidized loans, raising interest rates and reducing incentives for private lenders to provide student loans.
November 12, 2005
House Dems: President’s Proposed Budget a Disaster for America
Catastrophic Impact on Military Families, Rural Americans, Seniors and Working Families
Washington, D.C. – House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi released the following statement from House Democrats in response to the President’s proposed budget:
The President’s proposed budget is a plan for disaster that would return us to Herbert Hoover’s America. The administration’s agenda betrays our men and women in uniform, abandons rural Americans, impoverishes seniors and systematically attacks working families. It increases our dependence on foreign oil, despoils America’s natural treasures, ends our national commitment to space exploration, ignores America’s infrastructure needs and fails to provide aid to the Gulf Coast to heal the ravages of Hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. We are, however, heartened by the Administration’s recognition that permanently extending its 2001 and 2003 tax cuts would be fiscally irresponsible and infeasible.
The Bush administration’s budget:
Betrays Military Families: At a time when our men and women in uniform are fighting around the world to protect America – and in a budget released on Veterans Day – the administration seeks to slash military health benefits by $5.2 billion by weakening military families’ health benefits and increasing medical costs for veterans. The latter move comes in a cut whose savings will come largely from reduced medical services for men and women who have served in our nation’s uniform.
Abandons Rural America: The administration’s budget would be a catastrophic blow to rural America. By eliminating the Essential Air Service program and slashing funding for long-distance AMTRAK routes that disproportionately service rural areas, it devastates a major transportation and economic link for many small towns and isolated communities. By privatizing the Tennessee Valley Authority Southeastern Power Administration, it opens the door for private power companies to price-gouge or abandon rural families and farmers. By eliminating the Appalachian Regional Commission, Denali Commission and Delta Regional Authority, it slashes education, job-creation and health care aid to some of the neediest and most isolated rural communities in America. By ending federal support for the Rural Community Advancement Program, it reduces economic assistance to rural communities in need. By reducing support for medical education, it will exacerbate the health care crisis caused by a shortage of rural medical practitioners.
Impoverishes Seniors: The administration’s proposals constitute nothing short of an attempt to destroy the Social Security system that has been America’s most effective program to eliminate poverty among our seniors. The administration drastically raises the retirement age and slashes cost-of-living adjustments for seniors living on a fixed income. It cuts spousal benefits in a move that punishes widows and widowers – especially damaging for seniors in single-income families. The administration also changes the computation period for benefits in a move that disproportionately harms parents to interrupt their careers to raise their families.
Attack on Working Families: The administration’s proposal undercuts efforts to keep American workers competitive in a global market, creates a hidden tax on the middle class, worsens the already-critical health care crisis and bizarrely withdraws support for children and students.
Attack on American Workers: By weakening anti-dumping laws, eliminating trade adjustment assistance for workers displaced by outsourcing and foreign competition and ending efforts to promote American businesses abroad, the administration tears down efforts to keep American workers and businesses competitive in a global market. By weakening prevailing-wage provisions for federal construction, it jeopardizes the quality of federal construction projects while driving down wages for skilled construction workers.
Hidden Tax on the Middle Class: By failing to address the serious flaws in the Alternative Minimum Tax, the administration by default is imposing what will soon become a serious hidden tax on the middle class. Designed in 1969 to tax 155 wealthy taxpayers, the AMT will by 2010 increase taxes for almost 31 million middle-class taxpayers, with disproportionately higher burdens on married couples and families with children.
Exacerbating the Health Care Crisis: The administration’s budget makes numerous cuts to the medical safety net that have the combined effect of restricting patients’ access to medical services and shifting costs from the federal government to patients and local governments.
Shortchanging Children and Students: In some of its most inexplicable cuts, the administration proposes to eliminate funding for anti-violence and anti-drug efforts in schools and communities as well as anti-drug advertising – effectively giving up on attempts to deter our children from illegal drug use. The administration also plans to reduce funding for child nutrition programs in schools and drastically cuts our efforts to make college affordable for all children by decimating the federal student loan program – eliminating subsidized loans, raising interest rates and reducing incentives for private lenders to provide student loans.
posted by Leslie H # 5:52 PM 
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