Abstract

BUSH TO CITY: DROP DEAD

George Bush and the Republicans who control both houses of Congress have starved New York for three years with fiscal policies that alternate between abuse and neglect. But now Bush will stage his renomination convention in the city he has used and abused--sticking his finger in our eye and exploiting our bereavement. This August, Karl Rove, the kitschy guru of political theater, will try to convert the crematorium of Ground Zero into a re-election billboard. The most at-risk city in America had been cut by two-thirds. Homeland security money has become another run-of-the-mill pork-barrel patronage operation, like highways. On a per capita basis, New York State ranks forty-ninth among the states in antiterrorist funding, far below rural, sparsely populated Wyoming, Montana and North Dakota. Or consider the Bush Administration's treatment of first responders. It has recently eliminated its only program providing funds for upgrading police and fire department radio communications. Before I get to how Bush screwed New York on healthcare, education and housing, let me emphasize: All American cities are getting shortchanged and stiffed. Bush is not just targeting New York; he has no urban policy at all. It's not possible to know with certainty why Bush and his team have treated New York so unfairly, or what Bush says about us in private with the Rev. Jerry Falwell, Tom DeLay, Karl Rove and Dick Cheney. I suspect, but can't prove, that they want to punish us because so many New Yorkers are Democrats, union members, immigrants, blacks, Latinos, gays, war critics, civil libertarians, feminists, Jews, artists and bohemians.