Progress Report: Bush's Big Business Agenda

[Guest guest]

> Mon, 16 Aug 2004 09:13:58 -0700

> Progress Report: Bush's Big Business Agenda

> " American Progress Action Fund "

> <progress

>

 

Center for American Progress - Progress Report

by David Sirota, Christy Harvey, Judd Legum and

Jonathan Baskin

 

August 16, 2004

HEALTH AND SAFETY Bush's Big Business Agenda

DEMOCRACY The Death of Diplomacy

Under the Radar

 

Sign up | Send tip | Permalinks | Mobile | Print

 

HEALTH AND SAFETY Bush's Big Business Agenda

Analysis by The Washington Post and The New York Times

shows the Bush administration is continuing to use

regulatory action, exempt from Congressional oversight

and often hidden from public scrutiny, to further a

big business agenda despite demonstrated risks to

public health and safety. An extensive analysis by the

WP reveals the administration has employed regulatory

action " to implement far-reaching policy

changes#8230;Under Bush, these decisions have spanned

logging in national forests, patients' rights in

government health insurance programs, tests for

tainted packaged meats, Indian land transactions and

grants to religious charities. " The NYT notes the

public has been distracted by Iraq and the fight

against terrorism. Meanwhile, " Health rules,

environmental regulations, energy initiatives,

worker-safety standards and product-safety disclosure

policies have been modified in ways that often please

business and industry leaders. " The weakening of

regulations has possibly endangered " consumers,

workers, drivers, medical patients, the elderly and

many others. " Check out American Progress' and OMB

Watch's report on the Bush administration's

dismantling of public safeguards.

 

THE RECORD: According to the Post's analysis,

President Bush's deregulatory record represents a

radical departure from previous administrations. " All

presidents have written or eliminated regulations to

further their agendas, " the Post notes. " What is

distinctive about Bush is that he quickly imposed a

culture intended to put his anti-regulatory stamp on

government. " In the past 3 1/2 years, the Occupational

Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the branch of

the Labor Department in charge of workers' well-being,

" has eliminated nearly five times as many pending

standards as it has completed. It has not started any

major new health or safety rules, setting Bush apart

from the previous three presidents, including Ronald

Reagan. Unlike his two predecessors, Bush has canceled

more of the unfinished regulatory work he inherited

than he has completed. "

 

ADMINISTRATION SAYS SAFETY INFO " NOT OF MUCH

INTEREST " : One example of the Bush administration's

disregard for public safety: On Saturday, the NYT

highlighted a controversial regulation published by

the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration

forbidding the release of some data relating to unsafe

motor vehicles. Following the lead of auto company

lobbyists, the administration said " publicizing the

information would cause 'substantial competitive harm'

to manufacturers, " even though it might help consumers

choose safer cars. Chief spokesman Ray Tyson said he

was sure the now-suppressed information, which

includes " warranty-claim information, industry reports

on safety issues and consumer complaints, " would not

be " of much interest to the general public. " Last

week, the NYT documented how the administration is

trying to rewrite coal regulations in favor of owners,

rescinding " more than a half-dozen proposals intended

to make coal miners' jobs safer, including steps to

limit miners' exposure to toxic chemicals. "

 

QUESTIONING THE DATA: Since it would be embarrassing

to simply tell consumers and workers it's not willing

to make businesses pay to protect them, the Bush

administration has developed a different strategy for

achieving regulatory roll backs: question the science.

In today's WP addresses with the Data Quality Act, a

little-known piece of legislation " written by an

industry lobbyist and slipped into a giant

appropriations bill in 2000 without congressional

discussion or debate. " The act is supposedly meant to

ensure new regulations are based on " sound science, "

but the WP found it has been used predominantly by

industry to challenge scientific data indicating risks

to workers or consumers. Included among the petitions

so far: sugar interests challenged dietary

recommendations to limit sugar intake; logging groups

challenged calculations used to justify restrictions

on timber harvests; and the American Chemistry Council

challenged data meant to justify bans on wood treated

with heavy metals and arsenic in playground equipment.

 

HORMONE DISRUPTION NO REASON FOR ALARM: Hermaphrodite

frogs? No cause for alarm, says the Bush

administration, and no need to regulate the chemical

creating them. Indeed, the WP says the Environmental

Protection Agency (EPA) used language provided by a

petition filed under the Data Quality Act to stifle

reforms aimed at curbing the use of atrazine, a major

weed-killer found by scientists to disrupt hormones in

wildlife #8211; " in some cases turning frogs into

bizarre creatures bearing both male and female sex

organs. " A sentence added to the EPA's final

scientific assessment last year stated that " Hormone

disruption#8230;cannot be considered a 'legitimate

regulatory endpoint at this time' -- that is, it is

not an acceptable reason to restrict a chemical's use

-- because the government had not settled on an

officially accepted test for measuring such

disruption. " The language " rendered moot hundreds of

pages of scientific evidence. "

 

DEMOCRACY The Death of Diplomacy

This weekend, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez #8211;

an increasingly authoritarian ruler #8211; appears to

have overcome a " referendum to remove him from office

two years before his term expires. " The Bush

administration may be indirectly responsible for this

autocratic populist's retention of power; in April

2002, when Chavez was overthrown in a military coup,

the White House threw its support behind the new,

illegitimate government. As a result, once Chavez

regained power, the White House lost legitimacy in

speaking out in defense of democracy. In this

election, Chavez was able to rouse much of the

populace into believing the recall vote was an overt

attempt by the American government to replace him with

a puppet regime. On the last day of his campaign,

Chavez rallied his supporters by declaring the vote

was not about " whether Chavez stays or Chavez goes.

[it] is whether Venezuela continues to be a sovereign

state or turns into a Latin American colony. " To top

off his speech, he declared, " Bush's government will

be defeated on Sunday. " The situation in Venezuela is

part of a larger pattern by the Bush White House of

abandoning diplomatic attempts to shore up democracy.

 

PAKISTAN: President Bush has lavished praise on

Pakistani President Musharraf #8211; a leader who has

restricted democracy after seizing power in a coup.

Even as the State Department cites Pakistan for

serious human rights violations, the administration

doles out hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign

aid to the country, without demanding greater respect

for human rights.

 

IRAQ: This weekend, Iraqi delegates gathered for a

conference intended to select an interim parliament.

The conference was beset by problems; the conference

withstood a mortar attack by the insurgency which

killed two, and many of the attendees charge the

current interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi stacked the

slate with his own supporters.

 

AFGHANISTAN: Afghanistan will hold a democratic

election on 10/9. Registration has been a long,

difficult process, however, and parts of the country

remain firmly in the grasp of violent warlords and

Taliban forces. Unfortunately, the United States

diverted troops and resources to the war in Iraq,

leaving Afghanistan without the security it needs to

hold elections. An officer with the Afghan army

charges the Taliban is as strong as ever and focused

on disrupting the election. According to one Afghani

citizen, " When we go to a village, we persuade people

to take part in elections, but when we leave the

Taliban threatens them. " In the province of Zabol, for

example, people are still too frightened to

participate in the election; " fewer than half of the

124,000 eligible people have received voter cards, and

only 8 percent of those are female. "

 

BOLIVIA: In 2003, the president of Bolivia, Gonzalo

Sanchez de Lozada, asked the Bush White House for

emergency help to quell unrest stemming in part from

the U.S. drug eradication program. The Bush

administration refused. Months later, the president

was toppled by the drug cartel in a violent revolt.

#160; " Bolivia is a typical case of U.S. inattention to

'weak' states, which may become a costly security risk

in the future, " says a report by the Commission on

Weak States and U.S. National Security, chaired by

former Clinton administration Deputy Treasury

Secretary Stuart Eizenstat and former Republican U.S.

Rep. John Edward Porter of Illinois. Nancy Birdsall of

the Center for Global Development concurs: " This is a

case where the United States, for a paltry amount of

money, could have helped secure a country in Latin

America. "

 

IRAQ'S SAD IRONY: The editor of Foreign Policy

magazine, Moises Naim, writes in the Financial Times

that America must not give up promoting democracy. The

war in Iraq has left U.S. policy makers skeptical of

any true progress in the Middle East. Writes Naim: " It

is a sad irony that the political will to promote

democracy abroad is a casualty of a war that, many of

its promoters said, was waged in democracy's name. "

#160;

 

CUTTING GRASS-ROOTS DEMOCRACY: This summer, the

Republican-led House of Representatives " voted

decisively for an appropriations bill amendment that

would, among other things, cut a proposed increase in

funding for the promotion of democracy in the Middle

East. " The money " had been proposed for the budget of

the National Endowment for Democracy, one of the few

American institutions seriously committed to

long-term, grass-roots democracy promotion -- training

judges, journalists, parliamentarians and others --

all over the world. " Instead of a promised $40 million

increase in the crucial program, the increase was

slashed to $11 million, and finally cut to just $1

million.

 

SILENCING DIPLOMACY: The Bush administration has also

slashed funds for other diplomacy programs. At a

recent Council on Foreign Relations foreign policy

discussion, Joseph Nye of the Kennedy School for

Government explained what a low priority diplomacy has

become in the current administration: " If you look at

the hours of broadcasting the Voice of America does to

Pakistan in Urdu #8211; remember, Pakistan's a

front-line state #8211; we do two hours of

broadcasting a day in Urdu. Total American

expenditures in the year 2002 on public diplomacy for

the Muslim world #8211; not just Arab, Muslim world -

$150 million. It's about two hours of the defense

budget. " Last December,#160; the White House also led

the charge to eliminate Radio Free Europe. As the

Washington Post reported, the program cost just $11

million a year and is considered " one of the cheapest,

most effective and most popular tools of U.S. public

diplomacy. " The WP opined, " [The cuts] are yet another

example of the administration's poor choice of foreign

policy priorities. "

 

Under the Radar

JUSTICE #8211; TRAMPLING ON FREE SPEECH: The

Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC)

#8211; the same people who said that torturing terror

suspects could be justified #8211; has given " its

blessing to controversial tactics used last year by

the F.B.I. in urging local police departments to

report suspicious activity at political and antiwar

demonstrations. " Now, in advance of the GOP

convention, " the Federal Bureau of Investigation has

been questioning political demonstrators across the

country, and in rare cases even subpoenaing them. "

When an F.B.I. agent charged that the activity

infringed on protected speech, the OLC insisted that

" any possible 'chilling' effect caused...would be

quite minimal and substantially outweighed by the

public interest in maintaining safety and order during

large-scale demonstrations. "

 

HOUSING #8211; BUSH PRAISES PROGRAM HE IS PLANNING TO

CUT: In a speech last Wednesday, Bush said a federal

program that assists Native Americans in securing

housing was " making the American dream available to

all. " Bush added, " I can't think of a better use of

resources. " What Bush didn't mention was " the U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development plans to

cut the budget " of the housing program he lauded.

Bush's proposed budget for the next fiscal year " would

reduce the program's annual funding from $5.3 million

to $1 million. "

 

ENVIRO #8211; THE NOT-SO-SUPERFUND: The New York Times

reports, " dozens of Superfund sites that are eligible

for cleanup money are likely to be granted nothing or

a fraction of what their managers say is needed

because of a budget shortfall that could exceed $250

million. " As a result, at Superfund sites around the

country, " cleanup managers are likely to fall behind

in clearing toxic residue like lead particles, cyanide

and arsenic in soil or groundwater. " The problem: " the

original cleanup fund, built on industry taxes, has

dwindled to negligible levels in the nine years since

Congress abolished those taxes. " A House

Appropriations subcommittee controlled by

conservatives " recently recommended rejecting the

E.P.A.'s request for an additional $150 million for

the next fiscal year. "

 

INTELLIGENCE #8211; GOSS' BIG IDEA: Rep. Porter Goss

(R-PA) #8211; who President Bush recently nominated to

head the CIA #8211; has recently introduced

legislation that would allow the agency to arrest U.S.

citizens. The bill would " substantially alter#8212;if

not overturn#8212;a 57-year-old ban on the CIA

conducting operations inside the United States. " The

Goss bill " would enable the president to issue secret

findings allowing the CIA to conduct covert operations

inside the United States#8212;without even any

notification to Congress. " According to Jeffrey H.

Smith, a former general counsel of the CIA, the

language of the legislation " on its face would have

allowed President Nixon to authorize the CIA to bug

the Democratic National Committee headquarters. "

 

 

Features DON'T MISS

CORPORATE: Wal-Mart trying to paper-over controversial

business tactics by advertising on public radio.

 

TERRORISM: Pakistani source tells Los Angeles Times

that Bush administration is pressuring the government

to capture more high-level targets before the November

election.

 

VOTING: Is the Florida Department of law enforcement

trying to suppress votes?

DAILY GRILL

" Today, because the world acted with courage and moral

clarity...[iraqi] athletes are competing in the

Olympic Games. "

 

- George W. Bush, 8/14/04

 

VERSUS

 

Iraq sent " a four-athlete team...to the 2000 Olympics

in Sydney. "

 

- U.S. State Department

DAILY OUTRAGE

A new ruling from the Federal Communications

Commission " prohibit businesses from offering

broadband or Internet phone service unless they

provide Uncle Sam with backdoors for wiretapping

access. "

To from this mailing, please click here