If President Bush was truly interested in promoting ownership in America, he would stop pursuing economic policies that reward the few while the many lose ground.

For starters, he would:

– Start fixing a broken healthcare system that’s straining families and small businesses.

– Drop his opposition to a living wage.

– Reverse his plans to cut back Pell grants that make college affordable to working- and middle-class kids.

– Craft trade and tax policies that clamp down on the flight of jobs abroad.

– Abandon his plans to extend the tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent – those who make $1 million or more. (They already received $148 billion in cuts last year.)

– Ditch his risky Social Security privatization scheme that would require benefit cuts and jeopardize millions of men and women who live a few steps away from relentless poverty.

Let’s try a novel idea and intelligently structure a domestic policy that pursues the most good for the most people for the longest time.

Dave Eiffert

Snoqualmie