Domestic policy of the George W. Bush administration
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This article discusses the domestic policy of the George W. Bush administration, from 2001 to the present day.
Contents |
[edit] Diversity and Civil Rights
[edit] Secularism and religious diversity: "Faith-Based Initiatives"
In early 2001, President Bush worked with Republicans in Congress to pass legislation changing the way the federal government regulated, taxed and funded charities and non-profit initiatives run by religious organizations. Although prior to the legislation it was possible for these organizations to receive federal assistance, the new legislation removed reporting requirements which required the organizations to separate their charitable functions from their religious functions. Bush also created the White House Office of Faith Based and Community Initiatives. Several organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized Bush's faith-based initiative program as violating the principle of separation of church and state and being unconstitutional, and questioned if it violates the establishment clause of the first amendment.
[edit] Sexual diversity
Bush is opposed to the legal recognition of same-sex marriages and supports the establishment of civil unions ("I don't think we should deny people rights to a civil union, a legal arrangement" - ABC News October 26, 2004), and has endorsed the Federal Marriage Amendment, a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would define marriage as being the union of one man and one woman. Bush reiterated his disagreement with the Republican Party platform that opposed civil unions, and said that the issue of civil unions should be left up to individual states. In his February 2, 2005 State of the Union address he repeated his support for the constitutional amendment.
During Bush's first term, his nominee as ambassador to Romania, Michael E. Guest, became the first openly gay man to be confirmed by the Senate as a U.S. ambassador. (The first openly gay ambassador, James Hormel, received a recess appointment from Bill Clinton after the Senate failed to confirm the nomination.) [1]
[edit] Racial diversity
Bush has tended to be opposed to forms of affirmative action, but expressed appreciation for the Supreme Court's ruling upholding selecting college applicants for purposes of diversity.
Although President Bush did meet with the National Urban League, the nation's oldest civil rights organization, he has been criticized for failing to meet with the NAACP, a longstanding civil rights group, during his term in office; he is the first sitting President not to do so since Herbert Hoover, although he did meet with them during the 2000 campaign. During the 2004 campaign, Bush declined an invitation to speak, at first citing scheduling conflicts; later on, several of Bush's staff also cited critical political advertisements that the group ran as a reason not to attend.
[edit] Immigration
Bush proposed an immigration bill that would have greatly expanded the use of guest worker visas.
[edit] Science
Scientists have repeatedly criticized the Bush administration for reducing funding for scientific research, setting restrictions on Federal funding of stem cell research, ignoring scientific consensus on critical issues such as global warming, and hampering cooperation with foreign scientists by employing deterring immigration and visa practices.[citation needed]
[edit] Space exploration
On January 14, 2004, Bush announced a Vision for Space Exploration,[1] calling for a return to the Moon by 2020, the completion of the International Space Station by 2010 and eventually sending astronauts to Mars. To this end, the plan proposes that NASA's budget increase by five percent every year until it is capped at $18 billion in 2008, with only inflationary increases thereafter.[2] The planned retirement of the Space Shuttle fleet in 2010 after the ISS is completed is also expected to free up $5 billion to $6 billion a year. Although the plan was met with a largely tepid reception,[citation needed] the budget eventually passed with a few minor changes after the November 2004 elections.
Supporters believe that this plan will be an important part of what Bush set in place while in office. However, the policy has been criticized on two fronts. Firstly, critics have opined that the United States should deal with solving domestic issues before concentrating on space exploration. Secondly, of the funding over the next five years that Bush has proposed, only $1 billion will be in new appropriations while the remaining $11 billion will be reallocated from NASA's other programs, and therefore inadequate to fully realize this vision. Most of the spending for the new program, and most of the budget cuts for existing programs, are scheduled after the last year of the Bush presidency. It is unclear how the space vision will be reconciled with budgetary concerns in the longer term.
The $16.2 billion budget for 2005 proposed by NASA met with resistance from House and Senate spending committees, and the initiative was little-mentioned during the presidential campaign. Nonetheless, the budget was approved with only minor changes shortly after the November elections.
In January 2005 the White House released a new Space Transportation Policy fact sheet which outlined the administration's space policy in broad terms and tied the development of space transport capabilities to national security requirements.
[edit] Environment
Bush's environmental record has been attacked by environmentalists, who charge that his policies cater to industry demands to weaken environmental protections. He signed the Great Lakes Legacy Act of 2002 authorizing the federal government to begin cleaning up pollution and contaminated sediment in the Great Lakes, as well as the Brownfields Legislation in 2002, accelerating the cleanup of abandoned industrial sites, or brownfields, to better protect public health, create jobs, and revitalize communities. In December 2003, Bush signed legislation implementing key provisions of his Healthy Forests Initiative; environmental groups have charged that the plan is simply a giveaway to timber companies. Another subject of controversy is Bush's Clear Skies Act; opponents say that the initiative will in fact allow utilities to pollute more than they do currently. During his first presidential bid, Bush stated he supported the Kyoto protocol global warming treaty, but once in office he reversed that position, saying it would harm the U.S. economy. Environmental groups note that many Bush Administration officials, in addition to Bush and Cheney, have ties to the energy industry, automotive industry, and other groups that have fought against environmental protections. However, Bush claims his reason for not supporting the Kyoto Protocol is that it unfairly targets the U.S. as opposed to other nations, especially China. (See Kyoto protocol, position of the U.S..)
[edit] Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
The Bush administration's plan to allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was rejected twice by the U.S. Senate in 2002 due to concerns that it would potentially harm Arctic wildlife in the region. [2]
[edit] The Clear Skies Act of 2003
Bush supported the Clear Skies Act of 2003, which repeals or reduces air pollution controls. This act reduces caps on toxic chemicals in the air and cuts enforcement of the Clean Air Act, and is opposed by environmentalist groups such as the Sierra Club. Bush has faced heavy criticism over his advocacy for the act, with Henry A. Waxman (D-California) describing its title as "clear propaganda." Among other things, the Clear Skies Act:
- Weakens the current cap on mercury pollution levels from five tons per year to 26 tons.
- Weakens the current cap on nitrogen oxide pollution levels from 1.25 million tons to 2.1 million tons, allowing 68 percent more nitrogen oxide pollution.
- Weakens the current cap on sulfur dioxide pollution levels from two million tons to 4.5 million tons, allowing 225 percent more SO2 pollution.
- Delays enforcement of smog-and-soot pollution standards until 2015.
- Allows industrial buildings undergoing renovation, modernization, or expansion not to install machines that allow the building to come into current environmental standards compliance.
By 2018, the Clear Skies Act would allow 450,000 more tons of nitrogen oxides, one million more tons of SO2, and 9.5 more tons of mercury than what would be allowed by enforcement of the Clean Air Act.
[edit] Criticism from the Union of Concerned Scientists
The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) and other groups have routinely denounced Bush for distorting or suppressing scientific findings. In a February 2004 report endorsed by sixty Nobel laureates, the UCS alleged a pattern of manipulation of scientific findings for political goals. One example cited was that when the administration asked the U.S. National Academy of Sciences to review work by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the academy supported the panel's findings that human activity was playing a role in climate change. Nevertheless, the administration excised this information from official reports, such as the EPA's State of the Environment report [3], and disregard it in policy decisions. The administration — and its appointees in the EPA — nonetheless defend the administration's policies.
In February 2004, over 5,000 scientists (including 48 Nobel Prize winners) from the Union of Concerned Scientists signed a statement "opposing the Bush administration's use of scientific advice". They felt that "the Bush administration has ignored unbiased scientific advice in the policy-making that is so important for our collective welfare." [4] [5]
On a related note, an eight-nation report compiled by 250 scientists due for publication on November 8th says the Arctic is warming almost twice as fast as the rest of the planet due to a build-up of heat-trapping gases.[6] [7]
[edit] Education
[edit] No Child Left Behind
In January of 2002, Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act, which targets supporting early learning, measures student performance, gives options over failing schools, and ensures more resources for schools. Critics (including Senator Kerry and the National Education Association) say schools were not given the resources to help meet new standards. The House Committee on Education and the Workforce said that the Department of Education's overall funding increased by $14 billion since the enactment of NCLB in fiscal year 2001, going from $42.6 billion to $56.6 billion in fiscal year 2005.[3]. Some state governments are refusing to implement provisions of the act as long as they are not adequately funded.[4]
In January of 2005, USA Today reported that the United States Department of Education had paid $240,000 to conservative political commentator Armstrong Williams "to promote the law on his nationally syndicated television show and to urge other black journalists to do the same." [8] Williams did not disclose the payments.
[edit] Sex education
While Bush was in office the CDC reframed information about condom usage on its website to favor abstinence, changed information on whether abortion and cancer are related to imply that they are,[citation needed] ran investigations on safer sex workshops and related organizations,[citation needed] advised researchers not to use words such as "gay" in grant proposals,[citation needed] and most recently, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration made Oregon health officials rename their conference from "Suicide Prevention Among Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgender Individuals" to "Suicide Prevention in Vulnerable Populations."[5]
[edit] Economy
[edit] Taxes
President Bush has implemented three tax cuts during his term in office: The Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 (EGTRRA), the Job Creation and Workers Assistance Act of 2002 (JCWA), and Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003 (JGTRRA).
During his first term, Bush sought and obtained Congressional approval for three major tax cuts. These temporary cuts, scheduled to expire a decade after passage, increased the standard income tax deduction for married couples, eliminated the estate tax, and reduced marginal tax rates. Bush has asked Congress to make the tax cuts permanent, but others want the cuts to be wholly or partially repealed even before their scheduled expiration, seeing the decrease in revenue while increasing spending as fiscally irresponsible.
Bush's supporters claim that the tax cuts increase the pace of economic recovery and job creation. They also claim that total benefits to wealthier individuals are a reflection of higher taxes paid. Individual income tax rate provisions in the 2001 law, for instance, created larger marginal tax rate decreases for people earning less than $12,000 than any other earners.[9]
His opponents contest job prediction claims, primarily noting that the increase in job creation predicted by Bush's plan failed to materialize. They instead allege that the purpose of the tax cuts was intended to favor the wealthy and special interests, as the majority of benefit from the tax cut, in absolute terms, went to earners in the higher tax brackets. Bush's opponents additionally claim that the tax cuts are a major reason Bush reversed a national surplus into a historic deficit.
In an open letter to Bush in 2004, more than 100 professors of business and economics at U.S. business schools ascribed this "fiscal reversal" to Bush's "policy of slashing taxes - primarily for those at the upper reaches of the income distribution". [10]
By 2004, these cuts had reduced federal tax revenues, as a percentage of the Gross Domestic Product, to the lowest level since 1959. The effect of simultaneous record increases in spending and tax reductions was to create record budget deficits in absolute terms, though as recently as 1993, the deficit was slightly larger than the current 3.6% of the GDP. In the last year of the Clinton administration, the federal budget showed an annual surplus of more than US$230 billion. [11] Under Bush, however, the government returned to deficit spending. The annual deficit reached an absolute record of $374 billion in 2003 and then a further record of $413 billion in 2004. [12], ([13]
[edit] Spending
Of the US$2.4 trillion budgeted for 2005, about US$450 billion are planned to be spent on defense. This level is generally comparable to the defense spending during the cold war. [14] Congress approved US$87 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan in November, and had approved an earlier US$79 billion package last spring. Most of those funds were for U.S. military operations in the two countries.
[edit] Trade
Bush supports free trade policies and legislation but has resorted to protectionist policies on occasion. Tariffs on imported steel imposed by the White House in March 2002 were lifted after the WTO ruled them illegal. Bush explained that the safeguard measures had "achieved their purpose", and "as a result of changed economic circumstances", it was time to lift them. [15]
President Bush signed the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement into law on August 2, 2005. The agreement is designed to create a free trade zone similar to the one embodied in the North American Free Trade Agreement.
[edit] Employment
During Bush's presidency, the U.S. population has risen by about three million people per year.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of unemployed was nearly 6.0 million in January 2001 and 6.9 million in September 2006. The unemployment rate was 4.2 percent in January 2001 and 4.6 percent in September 2006. Employment peaked in late 1999 and declined through 2003. [16]
[edit] Economic Report
In 2004, a full chapter on Iraq's economy was excised from the Economic Report of the President, in part because it doesn't fit the "feel good" tone of the writing, according to White House officials. [17]
[edit] Health Care
Bush signed the Medicare Act of 2003, which added prescription drug coverage to Medicare, subsidized companies that sell these drugs, and prohibited the Federal government from negotiating discounts with drug companies. Critics claim that health care plans still are not affordable for those in lower income brackets; Bush states his policies offered more choice and help with the high costs of health care.
[edit] Social Security
Bush is an advocate of the partial privatization of Social Security wherein an individual would be free to invest a portion of his Social Security taxes in personal retirement accounts.
Bush has called for major changes in Social Security, identifying the issue as a priority for his second term. As of 2005 it is expected that he will offer a proposal incorporating reductions in benefit levels and partial privatization (allowing individual workers to invest a portion of their Social Security taxes in personal retirement accounts). Most Democrats and some Republicans are critical of such ideas, partly because of the large federal borrowing the plan would require ($1 trillion or more) and partly because of the problems encountered by the United Kingdom's privatized pension plan. See Social Security debate (United States).
[edit] References
- ^ "President Bush Delivers Remarks On U.S. Space Policy" 14 January, 2004 Release from NASA Facts
- ^ "Strategy Based on Long-Term Affordability" - A January 14, 2006 graph showing a plan for NASA's long-term budget
- ^ U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce (2005-02-17). No Child Left Behind Act Guide to "Frequently Asked Questions". Press release. Retrieved on 2006-10-19.
- ^ Dobbs, Michael. "More States Are Fighting 'No Child Left Behind' Law", 2004-02-19, p. A03 publisher = Washington Post. Retrieved on 2006-10-19.
- ^ Weiss, Rick. "Federal agency balks at word 'gay'", San Francisco Chronicle, 2005-02-15, p. A-2. Retrieved on 2006-10-19.
