The administration's budget plan includes taking $1.5 trillion over the next decade from payroll taxes that the government claims are earmarked for Social Security for the elderly. This move has reopened the discussion among big-business politicians over whether the government will pay for Social Security in the future. Both Democratic and Republican politicians pedal the false notion that Social Security funds are separate from the rest of the budget and risk going "bankrupt." Social Security benefits--won as a by-product of the mass social movement that formed the industrial trade unions in the 1930s and expanded under the weight of the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s--is an entitlement considered by working people to be a right.

Although several politicians have bickered over aspects of the budget, nobody has proposed waging a campaign to vote against it or to put forward a competing plan. The attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon have become a catchall excuse for cutting into the social wage.

Sen. Kent Conrad, a Democrat who heads the Budget Committee, called the proposed spending of the payroll taxes a "serious error," then cut to his main point. "I can tell you what we're not going to do," Conrad said. "We're not going to raise taxes in the midst of an economic downturn. And we are going to supply the president with the resources necessary to fight this war."

Peter Domenici, the ranking Republican in the Budget Committee, claimed that Republicans had earlier pledged to protect the Social Security "lock box," but "that pales now in comparison with the challenges brought about by September 11."  
 
Cuts in Medicare
The president's budget plan includes cuts in Medicare, which provides medical insurance for the elderly. This comes five years after the Balanced Budget Act, enacted under the Clinton administration, projected slashing spending for Medicare by $115 billion by 2003. The cuts already total $200 billion, accelerating the decline in medical care provided for retirees.

Over the last 13 months, more than 2 million people across the country have lost their health insurance. Conservative estimates put the number of people who have no medical care--including poor quality Medicaid and Medicare insurance--at more than 40 million. Dr. Henry Simmons, president of the National Coalition on Health Care, estimates that as many as 6 million people will be added to the ranks of the uninsured by the end of the year, as states cut Medicaid reimbursement and federal budget increases for Medicare continue to lag behind inflation.

Nationwide, teaching hospitals stand to lose $708 million annually, according to hospital administrators. These facilities often provide care for working-class patients who would otherwise have no access to such services.

Funding for public housing would also go on the chopping block. The plan projects a 6 percent cut, and the public housing capital fund, used to pay for repairs, would be reduced by nearly 15 percent. Local housing officials admit that tens of thousands of public housing units are already dilapidated and in need of major repairs. The actual figure is substantially higher.

The Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which covers a portion of heating bills, would face a 15 percent cut.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration all face 2 percent to 10 percent cuts. These agencies already have minimal powers to enforce minimum wage laws and occupation safety and other regulations and often take the side of bosses on these issues.

Meanwhile, Congress last year voted to gradually repeal by 2011 the tax on estates worth more than $1 million. This was part of a broader tax cut that returned a paltry few hundred dollars in taxes to most working people.  
 
Billions for 'homeland security'
While programs that benefit workers are slashed, a number of "security" firms stand to rake in big money from the $38 billion homeland security budget. Vance International Inc., an antilabor outfit, is among the 13,000 companies jostling for positions at the feeding trough. "Everybody is working on figuring out how they can fit into the program," president and CEO Charles Vance, a former Secret Service agent, told the Wall Street Journal. "There will be plenty to go around," he added.

Vance's payroll includes former FBI and Secret Service agents and former cops from police departments across the United States. Goons hired by Vance Security have been used as part of strikebreaking tactics by bosses facing resistance from workers. Last year a strike by newspaper workers at the Seattle Times were among a number of labor battles where bosses hired Vance Security thugs.

Bush's budget proposals also include an increase of $1.2 billion to the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to double the number of border patrol cops, add more spy planes, and develop a computer system to monitor the movements of the 330 million noncitizens who enter the United States each year. A computerized tracking system to check on foreign students was approved by Congress six years ago.

The INS has already set up a bureau that will oversee border patrols, investigations, and spying operations in a projected crackdown on an estimated 3 million immigrants who have expired visas. A memo obtained by the Washington Post revealed that the Justice Department has set up a database that includes information gathered from recent interviews of thousands of Middle Eastern men who were pressed to undergo interrogations by federal agents as part of Washington's antiterror campaign.

According to the Post, the INS has compiled a list targeting some 314,000 "foreign nationals" who have ignored court orders to leave the country. Federal cops will begin another round of interrogating and apprehending Middle Eastern immigrants who don't have legal documents. FBI and other Justice Department officials said arrests would begin soon of some 1,000 noncitizens from the Middle East and Pakistan.

Meanwhile, the Customs Service will receive an additional $619 million for more agents and upgraded equipment to tighten border restrictions. And the U.S. Coast Guard will get $282 million of "homeland security funds," which would be its largest annual budget increase in history. Coast Guard officials commented that some of the funds would be used for maritime SWAT teams and sea marshals.

Bush's proposed $379 billion military budget includes an increase of more than $48 billion that "is already drawing support from congressional leaders of both parties eager to back spending on national security," the Wall Street Journal reported February 5. Some $10 billion of the additional funds is also being proposed by Bush to be put into a "reserve fund" as a way to bypass Congressional approval of spending for future military assaults.  
 
 
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