Pacific Views

Heading Out Shortly

Posting will be very light from me starting Wednesday. I'm heading out to Iowa and then New Hampshire to volunteer with the Dean campaign, back on the 28th. The periodic update may be forthcoming, but I expect to be pretty thoroughly occupied.

Part of the reason I'm going is because I'm just awestruck by the level of participation in the political process this campaign fosters, and just for that, Dean deserves to win. But the other part is that Governor Dean treats voters like intelligent people who can handle more than a quick soundbite when he cuts through the bull to say things like this about the Bush Tax:

"...While the bottom 60% of Americans got a few hundred dollars in tax cuts, this was completely offset in Iowa, where property taxes were hiked the equivalent of $313 per household. To make matters worse, Iowans are paying roughly $850 more in college tuition and an average national increase of $276 in insurance premiums, while median household income in Iowa has dropped almost $900.

"Think about it: the Bush administration is giving you a few hundred dollars with one hand, while taking many hundreds more out of the other. That's not a tax cut -- it's the Bush Tax, brought about by shifting the burden of paying for necessary services to state and local governments, which have nowhere to turn but to their taxpayers.

"But let's be clear about what the Bush administration is really doing in the long-term. As they saddle the country with unsustainable, massive deficits, how long will it be before they argue that the federal government can no longer keep its commitment to Social Security? To public education? To Medicare? They will argue that to sustain these programs, our only choice is to privatize them. And with that, the social contract between the people and their government that has endured for decades will be declared null and void. ..."

Des Moines & Manchester, here I come! [Now, for the visit to the cold weather outfitters...]

Posted by natasha at January 12, 2004 03:46 PM | TrackBack