Reviving Faith in Role of Government (yes--if greed is left at the door).

[rodeodance]

......http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1109-29.htm

Published on Wednesday, November 9, 2005 by the Miami Herald
Reviving Faith in Role of Government
by Robert Steinback


It has been 25 years since Ronald Reagan declared war on the federal government, and five since President Bush and the extremist neo-conservatives took power intending to finish the job.

Is America better off? Are you?

The ranks of the poor are growing. Good jobs are fleeing overseas. Real wages have stagnated, personal debt is climbing and bankruptcies are soaring. Millions more Americans -- children in particular -- are without health coverage. Public schools are gasping for air. The rich are vastly richer -- but sharply higher fuel, tuition, insurance, health care and housing costs, to name just a few, have crippled middle-class progress.

The federal budget -- finally balanced just a few years ago -- is hemorrhaging red ink by the trillions, a burden we've callously dumped on our grandchildren.

Yet the only option on the discussion menu seems to be more of the same: More privatization, more tax cuts for the rich, further cuts in government services, regulation and oversight, more sell-offs of public land, more drilling in pristine seas and wilderness, more Halliburtons freed of the need to account for lost billions........