Kill the Poor

So Bush is finally noticing that he is running out of money, or actually WE are running out of money, he's doing just fine thank you! His latest budget proposals are almost laughable in that they do not include the cost of the war ($80 billion this year) or the cost of his social security changes. Some experts believe this could require borrowing of up to $4.5 trillion over a 20-year period. Woohoo! Good number crunching George!

His budget does include however: cuts of 9.6 percent at Agriculture, 5.6 percent at the Environmental Protection Agency, 6.7 percent at Transportation and 11.5 percent at Housing and Urban Development. Also the Monkey proposed savings ("savings" is a nice way of saying "big fucking cuts") of $137 billion over 10 years in mandatory programs with much of that occurring in reductions in Medicaid, the big federal-state program that provides health care for the poor, and in payments the Veterans Administration makes for health care. Good idea when there is a war on George!

All this at a time when the Pentagon's announced an increase to the plan that pays a one-time, tax-free "death gratuity" to survivors of military men and women killed in the line of duty. This would rise from $12,420 to $100,000. Wow! I always thought 12 Grand for the death of a Parent or Brother or Sister or Son or Daughter was a bit stingy!

Just bear in mind those numbers when you thank God that Merck CEO Raymond Gilmartin, hasn't had a heart attack or stroke yet. Gilmartin helped engineer "The Golden Parachute" deal for top Merck execs in the wake of the Vioxx scandal, if the company should get bought over due to plummeting stock price, he would get about $57 million to soften his landing.

So yeah keep on killing the poor. It's the only way for rich bastards to get richer. There was a Dead Kennedy's song that summed this up nicely, you can read it here.