Molly Ivins September 1CHICAGO — Reason No. 73,456,787,291 why people hate the media: The Dick Morris flap is about to get 1,000 times more coverage than the rather significant little item about last quarter's economic growth rate: 4.8 percent. I realize that Morris is a towering national figure who has been on all your minds constantly lo these many months, but a 4.8 percent growth rate might have a little more to do with your life. Your job prospects, your salary, whether you'll ever be able to get out of debt, buy a house or send your kids to college depend a whole lot more on economic growth than on Mr. Morris' private life. It's charming beyond belief that the Republicans are now claiming that the economy is not growing fast enough, although it's doing better than it did during either the Reagan or Bush years. They righteously point out that wages are stagnant; this is the same party that voted against increasing the minimum wage. It's kind of difficult to see the Republicans as the friends of labor, always pushing for higher wages. The party that gutted unions? The party that favors corporations at every turn? The party that wants to cut the Earned Income Tax Credit? Let's just take a moment over the EITC, one of those hideously named government entities that lead in turn to another acronym, MEGO (My Eyes Glaze Over). If the EITC had been called something sensible and real — like A Tax Cut for the Working Poor — we'd have a better idea of how it works and how important it is. Cutting taxes on the working poor not only gives them desperately needed income but also provides a greater incentive for the poor on welfare to get a job. The EITC was actually a Republican initiative to begin with, but President Clinton improved and broadened it. Now the Republicans want to stop it. That'll improve the stagnant wage situation no end. Now, on broader cultural fronts: The heavily contested schmaltz-off between the two parties was narrowly won by the Republicans.
Republicans and Democrats tied for honors in the Urp Department at their conventions. Two parties jointly responsible for just having passed a law that will adversely affect millions of poor children stood there in front of God and everyone, endlessly harping on how pro-family and pro-children they are. Urp. At least Texas Democrats are still fun. At Comptroller John Sharp's quadrennial shindig for Texans far from home, several great minds huddled off in a corner and organized Smokers for Clinton and the White Trash Caucus. The White Trash Caucus, although it does not discriminate on any grounds whatso-stinkin'-ever — like your being black or brown or something — is nevertheless the most exclusive group in American politics. Our temporary acting chairperson is Sarah Bailey King of Wood County, seen at the Sharp shindig with a major run in her pantyhose and smoking menthols. One membership requirement is that when you are at a fancy convention gala and a waiter comes by with a tray of canapes, your first question should be, "Is that free?" Next you have to ask, "Whut IS that?" Ann Richards did a wonderful riff on the Republican convention as a parody of the movie "Gaslight," in which a woman is driven insane by being pushed to believe that what she sees is not true and that what she remembers did not happen. "I thought WE were the ones trying to forget the '94 elections," Richards observed. In fairness to the Democrats, if anyone had told me five years ago that one of the major parties would finally work up the courage to take on both the tobacco lobby and the National Rifle Association, I would have thought the millennium had come. Come to think of it, it has. *** Molly Ivins is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. COPYRIGHT 1996 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
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