Dan Burton (Hypocrisy, Aristocracy)

FACT: Dan is an expert on sexual misconduct and special favors - his illegitimate son was once handed a fine, probation and community service after being caught in possession of 7.5 pounds of marijuana. It must have been for personal use! 

Jeb Bush (Aristocracy, Hypocrisy) 05/2002

FACT: Despite the fact that Jeb's daughter Noelle - who was recently arrested for attempting to purchase the controlled substance Xanax using a fake prescription - was sentenced to treatment rather than jail, he is still fighting a proposition that would require that first- and second-time nonviolent drug offenders be given treatment, as opposed to jail time. The proposal includes consequences - in some cases more severe than the current drug court penalties - if an offender fails the treatment program. However, Jeb says, "This amendment would destroy the best drug court system in the country," 

The Bush Administration (Lies, Aristocracy)

FACT: The Bush Administration wants the American people to know that the skies are safe, and in a public display of confidence, they've been sending various cabinet officials on commercial airline flights around the country. However, it was discovered last week that they've been pressuring the FAA to re-assign air marshals to the commercial flights with cabinet officials on them - in some cases removing marshals from other flights considered to be at a greater risk of hijacking. 

Bush Administration (Corporate Interests, Aristocracy, Punish the Citizenry) 

FACT: Soon after 911, the Senate recently voted 100-0 to federalize airport security. The House Republicans and Bush, however, think that private companies should provide airline security, which makes sense since it has obviously worked flawlessly up to this point. 

COMMENT: Unfortunately, it seems that the Republicans paranoid fear of  "big government" trumps any need for public security via decent airport security..

The Bush Administration (Corporate Interests, Oil, Pro Terrorism, Personal Interest, Aristocracy) 

FACT: According to the Boston Herald, Saudi Arabia is, "perhaps the biggest incubator for anti-Western Islamic terrorists." The Bush administration seems skillfully able to overlook this minor detail, what with all the money flowing into their pockets and all. W may like to "root out the evil-doers" but certainly not if they're lining his pockets. Take for example former president George H.W. Bush, senior adviser with the Carlyle Group, an organization which has deep ties to the Saudi royal family. Or Dick Cheney, who as head of Halliburton, Inc. worked to secure several large contracts with Saudi companies. Or Condoleeza Rice, who was a member of the board of directors of Chevron, another company with numerous Saudi business connections. 

Bush Administration (Aristocracy) 

FACT: The Sunday Telegraph reports that the Bush cabinet is the wealthiest in US history, averaging $11 million each. 

Bush (Prescription Drugs, Aristocracy, Lies, Enron, Tax Cut) 06/2002

FACT: In Bush's prescription drug plan, you don't get any prescription drug help if you're a senior citizen who lives on more than $17,000 a year. 

COMMENT: From Paul Begala, "So that in George Bush's America, if you're an old couple, retired, living on $17,000 a year, you're so rich you can't get prescription drug help. But if you're an Enron executive living on $17 million a year, you're so poor that you get a tax cut and a bailout." Thanks Paul.

George W. Bush (Aristocracy, Foreign Policy, Stupidity, Nepotism) 

FACT: It is not unusual for an incoming Administration to reward their friends and big donors with ambassadorships to largely innocuous posts in places like the Bahamas, Andorra, or Micronesia. But President Bush has a different idea. According to USA Today, so far Bush has given 22 out of 27 ambassadorships (81%) to "people with political or personal connections and no diplomatic experience". He even nominated a former college fraternity brother to be ambassador to China. 

COMMENT: Sino-U.S. relations are already strained and in need of an experienced diplomat to mend the wounds. Old frat brothers don't quite make it. So here is another threat to world stability resting on the pseudo-nepotistic preferences of an illegitimate president.

George W. Bush (Hypocrisy, Aristocracy)

FACT: Despite his "Three-Strikes" program (Instituted as Governor, which made jail time mandatory for anyone convicted 3 times for any reason) and his new policy of denying college funding to any person who has been convicted of a drug-related crime, (including possession), Bush is very soft on his own drug use. Remember back in the campaign when Bush dodged questions about allegations of cocaine use? Obviously not wishing to buy into the idea that drug use is some youthful right of passage, one of Bush's answers was, "When I was young and irresponsible, I was young and irresponsible." 

COMMENT: Under the laws that he has enacted since being elected Governor of Texas, Bush would have served some time in jail and been denied government student loans, not that he would have needed them, with Poppy's money and all.

George W. Bush (Aristocracy) 

FACT: Robert Novak's quote from "The Capital Gang", "I think that the person who is to blame is George W. Bush for passing those tough enforcement laws in the state of Texas, that if his daughter gets caught again under those laws she goes to jail - of course, she won't go to jail - but these are ridiculous laws, and everybody is too excited about teenage drinking" Did you spot the mistake? 

COMMENT: Yes, a right-winger actually admitted that which is already well known - if you're rich and well connected, laws need not apply

Bush (Aristocracy, Anti-Children) 

FACT: Bush cuts the Childcare and Development Block Grant by $200 million. In addition, a program designed for child abuse prevention would be cut by eighteen percent, $15.7 million. Bush's budget would completely eliminate a $20 million program dedicated to improving early childhood education and development.

COMMENT: To keep this in perspective, the Defense budget is in excess of $360 billion (i.e. 
$360,000 million). To boot, a recent GAO reports shows that tens of billions of dollars are unaccounted for within this budget.

George W. Bush (Cover up, Criminal, Aristocracy)

FACT: Bush signed an executive order which countermands the 1978 Presidential Records Act, and conveniently prevents Ronald Reagan's papers, which were due to have been released last January, from being released at all. 

COMMENT: Now why would they go and do a thing like that for? Could there possibly be something in those papers that would tarnish the image of the Godly Ronald Reagan and his silver plated henchmen? Note, that half of Bush Jr.'s administration used to be a part of the Reagan administration.

George W. Bush (Hypocrisy, Punishing the Impoverished, Corporate Interests, 911)

FACT: In the winter of 2001, Bush refused to release $300 million earmarked to help the poor pay their heating bills, citing the possibility of a milder winter this year. Cold weather state lawmakers are trying to encourage Bush to release the funds.

COMMENT: In addition, the number of people seeking heating assistance will rise this year, due to layoffs following the September 11 attacks. All this while Bush gave the airlines $14 billion. 

George W. Bush (Corporate Interests, Aristocracy) 03/16/2002

FACT: Bush has used every excuse imaginable to promote his fiscally devastating $1.6 trillion gift to the wealthiest 1% of Americans: the economy is strong. The economy is weakening. Gas prices are going up. We're at war. The situation is inconsequential because the solution is always - tax cuts! In addition to Bush's initial $1.6 trillion Tax Cut debacle (true long-term estimated impact of $4 trillion), the administration is now pushing a supplemental tax cut plan. This one was narrowly voted through by the (Republican controlled) House. According to the LA Times, "80% of the benefits from the proposed capital gains tax cuts would go to the richest 2% of Americans." That sounds fair. The LA Times goes on to report that, unbelievably, payroll taxes may have to be raised in order to pay for the capital gains tax. 

COMMENT: Ah, the reverse Robin Hood approach…always popular with the electorate. But wait, Bush wasn't elected, in fact more people voted for Gore. Indeed, it was the wealthiest members of the country that "installed" Bush in the "White House". So now, I guess it actually makes sense after all. Bush is simply representing his true constituency. He is a fine leader after all. Bravo. 

George W. Bush (Punish the Impoverished/Children, Tax cuts for the rich) 

FACT: During the campaign, George W. Bush liked to say that he would "Leave no child behind." Soon after these proclamations, he announced that he was cutting spending on childcare and support for abused children by $200 million, in order to pay for his tax cut for the rich. In addition, those who actually need government support for childcare aren't getting a tax cut, even though they pay federal payroll tax. 

George W. Bush (Secrecy, Criminal, Aristocracy) 

FACT: The scheduled release of 68,000 pages of Reagan era documents is delayed by the incoming administration, which says it wants until March to review them, in violation of the Presidential Records Act of 1978. The papers cover the period when Osama Bin Laden was recruited and trained by the Reagan Administration, as well as the period when arms were being sold secretly in the Middle East to finance the terrorist campaigns of the Contras. 

Bush (Tax Cut, Recession) 02/2001

FACT: Republican Greenspan testified that the "Tax Stimulus" argument to stimulate the economy is nonsense. Alan Greenspan tells the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee that tax cuts will be no help in staving off a recession. "In other words, if a recession is going to happen -- and I must say to you, it's not happened yet -- it's very unlikely to be affected one way or the other by what tax policy is going to be."

COMMENT: The reason the tax cut will have no effect on the recession is because it largely does not take effect for several years. Even then, the overwhelming bulk of the cut will go to the wealthiest Americans. In fact, the poorest members of our nation will receive NO tax releif since they currently pay only payroll taxes. (Bush was well aware of this when he proposed cutting only income taxes, death taxes and capital gains taxes, but not payroll taxes) From a fiscal stimulus perspective, this is useless, since these people already spend all the money that they want. A further influx to them will NOT increase their personal consumption. It will merely inflate their coffers, a useless action to the economy at large as a stimulus. In reality, the actual effect will be a negative impact on the economy since these trillions of dollars that will now be stashed away in the vaults of the super-wealthy would otherwise have gone into various programs such as education and other investments in the future of our nation and its economy. Of course the people who really need these funds are SOL and so is America.

Corporate Bastards (Greed, Corporate Interests, Aristocracy, Anti-Patriotic) 

FACT: An article in the New York Times makes note of the latest trend in legalized tax-dodging - incorporating in Bermuda. The best part of the deal is that corporations get to drastically reduce their tax burden while still being able to perform business in the United States. According to the Times, "by moving to Bermuda, their income from outside the United States becomes exempt from American taxes. Also, when the American company borrows from its Bermuda parent, the interest it pays creates a deduction that reduces U.S. taxes, but there is no tax on the interest earned by the Bermuda parent."

COMMENT: Post 9/11, Patriotism has become a big issue. The Bush administration publicly cries foul when someone isn't wrapping themselves in the flag or (God forbid) questioning the motives of the administration even though everything they do is "in the name of national security" (you know, overturning Roe v. Wade, corporate welfare and tax cuts to the rich. The usual.) In the mean time we are learning that "patriotism" doesn't apply to Bush's buddies and/or corporate pocket-pumpers. Indeed, the ever-so-patriotic Kate Barton, an Ernst & Young tax partner, had this to say on the subject of patriotism: "Is it the right time to be migrating a corporation's headquarters to an offshore location? ... we are working through a lot of companies who feel that it is, that just the improvement on earnings is powerful enough that maybe the patriotism issue needs to take a back seat to that." 

Don Evans (Punish the impoverished, Aristocracy) 

FACT: Commerce Secretary Don Evans stops the Census Bureau from adjusting the 2000 head count to include the undercounted. Evans says he decided the politically sensitive issue himself. Census numbers will be used for redistricting and the allocation of roughly $200 billion a year in funding for the next ten years. Minority communities, however, were disproportionately under-represented in the 1990 census and are the communities most affected by not using adjusted numbers. 

Katherine Harris (Taxpayers' Money, Aristocracy)

FACT: Republican legislators in Florida are now actively investigating Harris for spending inordinate sums of taxpayers' money on herself. According to the St. Petersburg Times, "During her first 22 months in office, Harris amassed more than $106,000 in travel bills, more than any Cabinet officer and the governor. She visited eight countries on 10 foreign trips, staying at luxury hotels at taxpayer expense." Believe it or not, Florida's budget for "international relations" (read: free vacations) has risen from $783,000 in 1999 to $3.4 million in 2001. 

Condoleezza Rice (Undermining Democracy, Aristocracy) 

FACT: Last week Condoleezza Rice gave a Republicans-only security briefing, excluding House Democrats from the proceedings. 

COMMENT: Forgive me for my ignorance, but I thought it was the president(sic)'s job to inform all elected federal officials in congress. Partisenship at the expense of the American people seems to typify the GWB administration. The outrage builds.

George Argyros (Aristocracy, Punish the impoverished/Citizenry, Criminal, Honor an Integrity) 

FACT: George Argyros, a Newport Beach billionaire who is the Bush2 administration's pick for ambassador to Spain owns nearly 5,000 apartments in Orange County, CA, which he rents to poor and middle-class tenants. A recent OC Weekly investigation discovered that he "rewarded employees with bonuses for illegally withholding security deposits, overcharging tenants for apartment repairs and billing tenants for imaginary expenses," not to mention "reprimanded employees when they did not defraud tenants," and let's not forget how he "angrily complained to top managers on at least two occasions that they were not sufficiently padding tenant charges." 

COMMENT: the $50 million that Argyros raised for Bush's presidential campaign heavily overshadowed Argyros's lack of qualifications for an ambassadorial role. 

David Bunning (Bigotry, Hypocrisy, Nepotism, Aristocracy, Affirmative Action) 

FACT: David Bunning, a 35-year-old kid whom the American Bar Association deemed "not qualified," was nominated for a federal judgeship. It turns out that David Bunning is the son of Republican Senator Jim Bunning so you can rest assured that he was approved.

COMMENT: It is well known that conservatives believe jobs should be awarded entirely on the basis of merit. This is the basis for their opposition to affirmative action of any kind. So all this talk of so-called "merit" is just a smoke screen to filter out those pesky minorities and woman. Oh well, that's OK, cuz rich kids deserve this support while others don't. (See also Strom Thurmond Jr., Scalia Jr., Bush Jr., Michael Powell - FCC Chief) 

Kay Bailey Hutchison (Indictment, Taxpayer's Money, Aristocracy, Ethics) 

FACT: "Senate staff are compensated for the purpose of assisting senators in their official legislative and representational duties, and not for the purpose of performing personal or other non-official activities." - so says the Senate Ethics Manual. But now Kay Hutchison, the junior senator from Texas, is causing a bit of a stir on Capitol Hill. It was alleged last week that she is indeed using her staff for unofficial and personal duties - duties which include chauffeuring her husband around town, checking out the mall sales at Tyson's Corner, Virginia, and bringing bagels and coffee to her home every morning and waiting on the doorstep without knocking until the door is opened. In fact, a source in her office reported that Hutchison threw a fit when a staffer showed up one morning with bagels from Union Station and not from her favorite bagel shop at Dupont Circle (halfway across town). However, it's not the first time that Hutchison has been in trouble for this kind of behavior - when she was Texas' state treasurer back in 1993, several staffers publicly accused her of making them perform personal tasks, and she was indicted by a grand jury for official misconduct that same year. 

Strom Thurmond Jr. (Nepotism, Aristocracy)

FACT: There's always nepotism. When Congress returns, Strom Thurmond Jr. will almost certainly be appointed to the post of U.S. Attorney, despite the fact that the 28-year-old is only three years out of law school. But his dad is the senior senator for South CarolinaSo what other credentials must one have to determine the fate of others.