By Marc Jampole
Snip, snip, snip. They’re cutting down the nets.
I’m not talking about overjoyed college basketball players standing
on ladders to cut down the basket nets to the cheers of rabid fans after
advancing to the next round of the National Collegiate Athletic Association
basketball tournament.
No, that loud and constant snipping sound we hear comes from
our nation’s capital where Republicans in the House of Representatives have voted
to shred the social safety net.
Healthcare aid to the poor. Cut.
Food stamps for families who can’t otherwise afford a decent
meal: Cut.
Special education. Cut.
Pell grants to help poor students afford a college
education. Cut.
Job training. Cut. Housing assistance. Cut. Federally-funded
research. Cut.
The one government function not to get the hatchet is
defense. The House budget actually gives the Pentagon more than it requested,
including $96 billion that the generals can spend without telling Congress why.
They call it the Overseas Contingency Operations funds, or OCO, but that’s just
a euphemism for a slush fund.
And not just for military spending, but for spending on war.
As a New York Times article
points out, the House budget gives the Defense Department less than it wanted
for basic operations, but more than double what it requested for waging war.
House Republicans say they are slashing programs to reduce
the deficit, but the fact they saved war from the cutting table suggests that
what they really wanted to do was stop paying for social welfare programs. Thus the budget takes money from poor people
and gives it to the military contractors and defense manufacturers who benefit
most from increased spending on war.
When we look at the money flow, it all makes sense. This
budget continues the proud Republican tradition of stealing from the poor to
give to the wealthy. It’s the essence of the Reagan agenda, which still guides
Republican economic policy. The true
objective behind the budget differs not a whit from that goal behind other
Republican actions that transfer money from the poor and middle class to the
wealthy, such as replacing public schools with charter schools that pay teachers
less and administrators more; cutting taxes on the wealthy while also cutting
social welfare programs; or making it easier for businesses to resist labor
unions so they can pay their employees less and keep more of the profits.
The House budget also includes language that could lead to
the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, which would end the health insurance of
millions of Americans, while driving up the cost of coverage significantly for
those lucky enough to keep their insurance. The House budget also takes the
first step to privatizing Medicare.
It’s not just the flow of money that makes the Republican
budget so odious, it’s also the values behind it: These self-proclaimed protectors
of American values say “no” to helping the young, the sick, the poor and the
elderly, but say “yes” to bombs, tanks and guns. I know these guys hated the 1960’s, but
that’s no reason to make “make war, not love” in a mockery of that earlier
age’s slogan projecting a world of peace and prosperity.
There is absolutely no chance that this budget will become
law. The more reasonable Senate will undoubtedly mess with it, and even if it
does pass in close to present form, President Obama will certainly veto it.
But all that means is that programs that help poor people, those
who send their children to public schools and those who use America’s roads,
bridges and mass transit systems will suffer gradual strangulation, not an
instantaneous deathblow. Why? Because without a budget, the sequester will
remain in effect and keep slowly choking the budgets of all federal programs.
And if the Republicans could somehow exempt military
spending from the sequester, they wouldn’t mind that outcome at all.
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