With Dick Cheney and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson hovering at his sides, President Bush addressed the nation this morning to call for a $145 billion tax rebate to jump-start the flat-lining U.S. economy.
Likening the package to "a shot in the arm to keep a fundamentally strong economy healthy," President Bush said. "This growth package must be temporary and take effect right away."
Temporary, folks. As in your estimated $800 piece of the pie will probably be taxed as part of your income for 2008 in 15 months.
Bush managed to bumble his way through his statement without once mentioning or acknowledging the word "recession," presumably out of fear of Dick Cheney (looming over Bush's right shoulder, increasingly resembles the shady Cigarette Smoking Man of X-Files notoriety) or Henry Paulson (a dead-ringer for Emperor Palpatine).
I know that if I get my $800 (mind you, I'm still waiting for my $300 from 2001. Perhaps the check got lost in the mail?), I'm expected to spend it unwisely. I'm expected to go to Wal-Mart and Starbucks and TGI Friday's and feast on the fruit of America's labor.
But you know what? I think, if it comes, I'm going to tuck it into my 401(k).
Why? Simply because the Bush administration doesn't want me to.
That's right. Sure, I could consider donating it to Emily's List, the Human Rights campaign, Greenpeace, the DNC, or one of the Democratic frontrunners. But what the Bush administration wants is to keep people like me in credit card and student loan debt for the rest of their lives. And by my financial advisor's calculations, in 15 years, that $800 will be worth an additional $3000 in my 401(k). In 40 years, when I'll be 65 and retiring, that's $25,000. And I'm going to take that $25,000 and throw my old ass a party on a yacht in the Greek Isles, where my liberal friends and I will toast ourselves and congratulate each other on having screwed the man who screwed us for eight straight years.
That's if I get my $800. Because in 2001, I was making around $12,000 a year, and I didn't get my $300. Come to think of it, I know a lot of "middle class folk" who didn't get their checks either.
Am I hurting the economy by saving my mythical $800 chunk of change? Single-handedly, probably not. But if there's one thing I've learned from this administration, it's that, to Bush, greediness is next to Godliness. And I'll be damned if I let my $800 help George W. Bush avoid having a recession on his filthy, blood-spattered record.