'A Blind Man in a Roomful of Deaf People'

The Ideological Road to Tax Cuts and War

The Bush administration moved yesterday to discredit former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill, who has revealed the inner workings of the White House in a new book by author Ron Suskind, “The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House and the Education of Paul O’Neill.” This is the latest attempt to intimidate anyone who questions the policies of the administration and quash debate on major issues that affect every American citizen – a process eerily familiar to what O’Neill calls the lack of debate in the Bush White House on the most critical issues. And it raises enormous questions about citizens’ rights to expect that the President and his advisers are making policy based on proper deliberation and evaluation of the facts, rather than blindly succumbing to the visions of conservative ideologues.

• The White House drowned out the voices of common sense who opposed giving the very wealthiest a second round of tax cuts. According to Suskind, as the administration debated the budgetary consequences of additional tax cuts, Vice President Dick Cheney told O’Neill, who argued against more cuts, “You know, Paul, Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter. We won the mid-term elections, this is our due.” Based on a verbatim transcript obtained by Suskind, even after President Bush asked simply, “Haven’t we already given money to rich people?” presidential adviser Karl Rove dismissed arguments that the tax cuts should go the middle class, saying: “Stick to principle. Stick to principle…Don’t waver.”
• Long before September 11th the White House planned to invade Iraq, with or without evidence that Saddam Hussein had weapons that posed an “imminent threat” to the U.S. In a 60 Minutes interview, Secretary O’Neill said, “From the very beginning, there was a conviction, that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go.” Suskind also recounts that O’Neill was surprised that no one in the Bush administration ever asked, “Why Saddam?” and “Why now?” according to 60 Minutes. “It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying, ‘Go find me a way to do this,’” O’Neill says in Suskind’s book.
• The only voices Bush administration officials hear are the special interests whispering in their ears. From rewriting energy and environmental policies that benefit big oil and big polluters to letting drug companies shape the prescription drug benefits for senior citizens, the Bush administration has demonstrated repeatedly whose interests it has at heart. Campaign cash and cronyism dominate this White House as never before. Suskind’s book, and Paul O’Neill’s candor in describing the Bush White House, provides further evidence of the overwhelming influence of these special interests.

For more on White House intimidation of dissenters, see this report from the Center for American Progress.

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