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The Pro-Business President?
Share / Recommend - Comment - Print - Wednesday, Feb 20 2008, 11:21AM
The Bush administration has bent over backwards to cater to business interests. At least, that's been my perception from the outside.
Last week, I met with an influential operative in the business community about the Law of the Sea. We agree on the importance of U.S. accession to the Convention as critical to national security, business interests and global sustainability -- but probably little else.
This individual had a very different perspective on the White House's relationship to business. He told me -- and I'm paraphrasing here -- that the White House rarely gives them advance notice when the administration does or says something that affects their interests.
In particular, he recalled with anger the maelstrom surrounding Vice President Cheney's energy task force. He promised me that there was nothing secret about the meetings and that some of them even took place in the offices of a trade association. And he continued -- furious at this point -- to complain that the task force's recommendations were more or less ignored as the White House presented its energy package to Congress.
None of this changes my view that Cheney's energy task force was highly irregular or that business interests carry too much weight in the Bush administration. But the fact that these folks don't feel heard in a very, very friendly White House speaks to the general incompetence of the administration and helps to explain why no one, not even Bush's natural base, wants more of the same.
-- Scott Paul
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Reader Comments (6) - post a comment
Crocodile tears from the business community, always attacking government intervention while begging for more corporate welfare. Has your influential operative forgotten about all the war profiteering in Iraq? Or the total lack of regulatory enforcement at home (Enron, sub-prime, etc.)? Or the massive tax breaks? Or is it just that your operative wasn't one of Bush/Cheney's cronies and didn't get his fair share of the loot?
Two major business slated to announce opening plants here. More steel industry work, it would appear.
Thank goodness EVERYBODY is finally tired of it.
Big Government is of, by and for Big Business. This is the reality that both Democrats and Republicans, who are for BOTH big business AND big government will never tell you.
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