The Washington Post reports today that Bush's budget hurts the poor.

The $2.23 trillion budget that Bush proposed to Congress last week would loosen federal standards and hand states vast new authority, if they want it, over housing subsidies, unemployment benefits, health insurance, and a preschool program for children from disadvantaged families, which is known as Head Start.

It would also make outright cuts in some poverty programs, such as a reduction by a fourth in the amount the government devoted last year to "community services" grants for dispossessed neighborhoods.

At the same time, the president is seeking nearly $1.5 trillion in tax cuts that would largely benefit the wealthy while potentially squeezing social spending for years to come.

These are not the same positions Bush endorsed when running for President. These are a continuation of Reagan "trickle down" economics--with a new label--"circular economics". Apparently, Bush has even more in store for us.

The president has not even publicly acknowledged this year's most dramatic tax proposal -- a plan to establish new savings accounts that would allow families to shield tens of thousands of dollars a year from all capital gains, interest and dividend taxation.... ...Policy analysts across the ideological spectrum say that the changes imbedded in Bush's budget, if adopted, would be virtually unrivaled in scale and scope. "Just the sheer volume of proposals . . . across an array of low-income programs . . . is breathtaking," said Mark Greenberg, policy director of the Center for Law and Social Policy, a nonprofit group that specializes in family and welfare issues.

To get around suggestions that he is cutting federal dollars from the budget for social programs, Bush has decided to merely transfer responsibility for running the programs to the states. Analysts say this is unwise:

"Offering state block grants in the middle of the most severe state fiscal crisis we've seen in a long time -- with little or no new federal aid -- almost guarantees that states will either fail to take up the option or that they will use the money in inappropriate ways," Isabel V. Sawhill, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said at a gathering of policy analysts held to assess the budget.

Bush's changes for Medicaid are sounding some of the loudest alarm bells among policy analysts and Democrats. After that come his changes to the school lunch program.

Barry Sackin, a vice president of the American School Food Service Association, said that he, too, thinks only eligible students should receive free meals, but that some of the methods the administration is contemplating would cause "collateral damage," mistakenly denying help to children who should get it.