Have you noticed that one of the Bushite's favorite words is "robust?"
It implies vigor, action, power. It's a manly sort of word that they
punch out of their mouths like a fist.
They've been using the word a lot lately to buff up George's image as an
unrelenting foe of terrorism, who is battling every aspect of the global
terrorist network. The President is "robust" in his commitment, they
bark at anyone who dares question Bush's actions or inactions.
Yet there's one aspect of battling terrorism that the Bushites have
gotten downright wimpy about: Tracking down the money that finances the
global network. While George himself has talked big about rooting out
the "evil doers" who put the money up for terrorist attacks, this is not
an area that the big banks and some of our supposed allies really want
to have deeply investigated.
So, Bush very quietly zeroed out a request by the IRS to increase by
half the number of investigators it has to follow the money trail of
terrorism. This is painstaking work that requires substantial staff with
the expertise, time, and backing to do the job. But in his latest
budget, which George hailed as evidence of his "robust" pursuit of the
bad guys, there is zero funding for the 80 additional criminal
investigators requested by the IRS.
This would not have come to light at all except that it was mentioned in
one sentence on the last page of a routine report to an obscure
congressional subcommittee by an even more obscure IRS oversight board.
Bush's defunding of IRS's financial diggers was caught by one alert
committee member, Rep. Earl Pomeroy, who has since been directing some
very "robust" questions to the White House.
A Bush PR flack responded that the treasury department, of which the IRS
is a part, got an overall budget increase, which, she says,
"demonstrates [Bush's] robust commitment" to tracking terrorist money.
But since that still doesn't get the IRS the 80 agents it needs, I'd
call that a "robust" dodge.