Reality Check. Lots of liberals think that Bush has a secret agenda that he will push through now that he has a clear majority in Congress and no longer has to worry about re-election. It will not happen. Bush will have trouble just getting his public agenda passed.

In making this prediction I am looking at recent history. Clinton took office in 1993 with a majority in Congress and a determination to roll back the Reagan/Bush years. His achievements were, at best, modest and he lost Congress in the 1994 election.

In 1995 Republicans took over Congress for the first time in decades. They were going to dismantle the welfare state, abolish PBS, and re-tool the country. It didn't happen. Clinton took the lead on welfare reform and little else was accomplished.

If Bush stays focused he can partially privatized Social Security. Some sort of major overhaul has to be done soon and the only real alternative that I have heard is to raise retirement age.

More on economic interest. My last post gave some examples of policies favored by some vocal members of the Democratic party that are against the economic interests of the working class. Here are a couple of more examples.

Global Warming. If you take the time to seriously research the subject you will find that there is a lot of reason to be skeptical. Never the less, many on the left want to go ahead and enact limits on CO2 emissions. In order to have any real effect we would have to cut emissions more than 60%. Industry would just about have to shut down (actually it would all move to China and India who do not have any limits under Kyoto).

Schools. 20 years ago I was a strong supporter of public schools. Then my daughter reached school age. It turns out that public schools are not set up to handle kids who are unusual. If the child has attention deficit problems (my daughter) or behavioral problems then they are labeled troublesome. Classes that are set up so that dumb kids can pass will fail smart kids with certain problems. The only alternatives are private and charter schools. Paying for private school is a burden and most Democrats want to shut down charter schools.

This is an area where the Democrats are losing some blacks. The Democrat image of the people using school vouchers and charter schools is whites running from minorities and evolution. In fact, it is overwhelmingly blacks, especially ones whose children have problems. The public schools have already failed these kids and they are looking for alternatives.

The Democrats are against all of this. The teachers unions are a major wing of the party and they hate the non-unionized private and charter schools.

Nice to know that they care. The British-based computer industry web site got a letter from the New Democratic Outreach Program. It is addressed from the blue states to the red states. Among other things is says:

Here in the Blue States, Democrats and Republicans alike generate the
lion's share of America's wealth, although it is you Reds who provide the lion's
share of the stoop labor. You are our Mexicans, so to speak. We could not have
accomplished the economic miracle that is America without your willing
capitulation to a system that lies to you and fucks you over at every
turn.

Look at economic output and educational achievement on a state-by-state
basis: it's painfully evident that we Blues are immensely more productive and
better educated than you Reds. We have lots more money. We live longer. We eat
better. We work less. We fuck more. We do cocaine and smoke fine Canadian buds,
not the homebrew crank and cheap Mexican headache reefer you guys are stuck
with. We drink French wine and Stoli martinis, not Budweiser. Our children
rarely bother us: we've got them on Ritalin and Prozac. Our teeth are straighter
and whiter, our necks longer, and our fingernails cleaner. And many of us are
the Republican elite who have just punked you.

That outreach is going to win over a lot of voters.