Our troops have armor, or are getting it as we speak. It has taken a couple of years to build the military back up, and then equip the men for war. It might be that there are soldiers who are not 'front line' who do not yet have body armor, but that just reflects the fact that the army hasn't moved into the 'every soldier is a combat soldier' mode required by this war.
As far as the rich not getting a tax cut, why shouldn't they get their own money back? They've been paying the lion's share of the taxes. Besides, in order to reduce the deficit, the economy needs to grow. In order for that to happen, there have to be people willing to take risks and either start new businesses or expand the existing ones. Who is going to do that and from where will the money come? That's right, those nasty rich folks. With the money that they don't have to send to the government in taxes, they can help create another couple of jobs which will provide greater revenue for the government.
People seem to have forgotten the double whammy that this Administration suffered in 2001. First was the recession that was inherited from the Clinton administration. George W. Bush was warning about it during the summer while he was running against Algore. Then as things had leveled off, along came 9/11 which was another HUGE blow to the economy. We're just now turning around from that.
Are you serious? The richest people in this country have been very blessed. They should be willing to do their share. I'm tired of their complaints about how hard they've got it, how unfair it all is. I'm sick of them whining to Washington and lining up at the gates with their hands out. Do you realize that some multi-billion dollar corporations doing business here pay absolutely no income tax? What kind of patriots are these? Why do they think they should get tax cuts when we're fighting a war? when our budget deficit is so high the World Bank no longer wants to certify us?
As for them putting the money back into the economy, where's your evidence. The rate of companies outsourcing has not slowed in the least, in fact it is continuing to grow and our government is continuing to give huge contracts to companies that are outsourcing our jobs. Not only that, we are outsourcing many many of the functions that used to be performed by our people in the government to other countries like India. The oil companies make record profits this year. How much did they pay in taxes. How much are we still paying for oil. The Iraqi's are pumping 2.5 million barrels of oil a day. At $48 a barrel, why are we footing the whole bill? Where's the money going?
So our troops have body armour? I just read an account by a soldier on one of the Veteran's forums about having to take apart old tanks in order to put armour on the sides of humvees. That was this week. Haliburton has literally ripped off millions of dollars in Iraq but, our soldiers still don't have properly armoured vehicles. It is an outrage!
Excuse me but, this president inherited a huge budget surplus. He's still trying to claim that the problem was the recession that he inherited when in fact, there was never any attemp what-so-ever to control spending. The amount of pork that makes it's way into spending bills is absolutely outrageous but, they get signed anyway. When does it stop? When do the American people say enough is enough and throw the whole bunch of them out on their ears?