CAG Press Release

Gary Zuckett, Exec. Dir. WV Citizen Action
304-346-5891
437-3701

WV Citizen Action:
Working Families Differ With Bush Over Real State of the Union

Seven years of upside-down priorities have left West Virginia families eager for investment in America’s real priorities

Charleston - President Bush’s final State of the Union address revealed that the President is still just as out of touch with America’s real priorities as he has been for the last seven years, West Virginia Citizen Action Group, a USAction affiliate, said today.

In his speech, Bush announced that his priorities for his last year in office include making the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts permanent, even as a recession spurred by his reckless handling of the economy looms. The president also spoke of the need for a balanced budget but his tax breaks for millionaires are what sent us into the red even before Iraq.

“After seven years of reckless economic policies that have resulted in the mortgage crisis and a looming recession, how can President Bush call for more of the same?” asked Gary Zuckett, Executive Director.  “West Virginia families know that a strong economy requires investment in America’s health care, education and human-needs priorities – not continuing tax breaks for millionaires and corporate interests.”

“His economic stimulus package ignores those who have lost their jobs and are running out of unemployment. Not extending unemployment benefits in this period of recession is a slap in the face to blue collar America,” Zuckett added

Bush also insisted that the war in Iraq should go on with no end in sight, even though it has claimed at least 3,923 American lives, destroyed the lives and livelihoods of countless Iraqis, and cost US taxpayers nearly $500 billion.

“Almost five years into his disastrous, endless war in Iraq, President Bush’s plan for the future calls for additional bloodshed and wasting more American resources abroad.  America’s working families know that we’ll be stronger, safer, and better able to invest in our real national priorities when we end this war and bring the troops home,” Zuckett said.

# # #

USAction and our affiliates in 24 states connect issues to elections and policy to politics. We seek to take our democracy back from the corporate elite and the well-heeled special interests that dominate the political process today – because we believe that government has a critical role to play in ensuring liberty and justice for all.  West Virginia Citizen Action Group is USAction’s West Virginia affiliate.