Prometheus 6   

Editorial run

Connecting the dots for poor children
(By Jack P. Shonkoff)
NEW RESEARCH findings raise concerns about biological markers of elevated stress and behavioral measures of increased aggression in young children who spend long hours in child care. Meanwhile, in Congress, the reauthorization of the federal welfare law is moving forward with a significant number of lawmakers pushing for increased work requirements for mothers of very young children. What is wrong with this picture?

Republican spending orgy
Jeff Jacoby

AT THEIR national convention three years ago, Republicans pointed with pride to the GOP's record of fiscal rectitude.

"In the four decades from 1954 to 1994," the Republican platform declared, "government spending increased at an average annual rate of 7.9 percent, and the public's debt increased from $224 billion to $3.4 trillion." Those were the profligate years, when Democrats usually controlled both houses of Congress.

"Since 1994," it went on, "with Republicans leading the House and Senate, spending has been held to an annual 3.1 percent rate of growth, and the nation's debt will be nearly $400 billion lower by the end of this year. The federal government has operated in the black for the last two years and is now projected to run a surplus of nearly $5 trillion over 10 years."

Missing from the Republicans' recitation was any mention of the Democrat who had been in the White House since 1993. Didn't President Clinton deserve any of the credit for the spending restraint and budget surpluses?

Not according to Republicans, he didn't. In their view, they were the ones who slowed the federal spending train and forced Clinton to curb his big- government impulses. If he had had a Democratic Congress to do his bidding, that train would have raced out of control.

So here we are three years later, with not only a Republican Congress but a Republican president, too -- and the federal spending train is racing out of control. The Bush administration estimated last week that the government will end the current fiscal year with a budget deficit of $455 billion. Over the next five years, the public debt is expected to rise by $1.9 trillion. The administration projects next year's federal outlays at $2.27 trillion, more than $400 billion higher than when the president took office.

America's Role in Liberia
Swift American intervention could help end two decades of carnage that has destroyed Liberia and crippled several of its neighbors.

Compassion and the Tax Cuts
As the Republican government's priorities become ever clearer, the status of the nation's poorest children is a prime litmus test for the G.O.P. vows of compassion.

Cartoons

Ann Telnaes has one of the most frightening cartoons ever presented.
Jeff Danziger as the host of Family Feud.
Ann Telnaes on why intelligence should be run by the intelligent.
Pat Oliphant gives us the recipe of the day.
Ann Telnaes show us the next one to take responsibility for the SOTU "inaccuracies inadvertantly uttered."

posted by Prometheus 6 at 7/24/2003 07:05:28 AM |