Bush's Road Trips a Waste of Money

There are known costs of the president's plan to privatize Social Security: More national debt, lower Social Security contributions, less assured income to retirees, questionable payments to survivors and the handicapped, and huge profits to investment companies with no guarantee of a stable stock market.

But there is one cost that no one seems to be talking about. Airplanes, helicopters, cars, the staff that travels with them and scores of Secret Service employees to protect everyone while the president and the vice-president crisscross the country. Sixty cities in 60 days, wasn't that their plan? Who's watching the store while they're out of town? All this expense to speak to handpicked crowds, which usually support President Bush but this time have given him some rare opposition. Why has no one calculated the costs of these road trips?

Why not speak on prime-time TV or hold a press conference and answer questions? Probably not something he would want to do, as the more people hear his explanations, the less likely they have been to support them. But just think of the tax dollars Bush could save if he trusted the American people enough to talk directly to them.

BETTIE REINA

Milmay

Letter Published in Atlantic City Press, April 21, 2005 http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/columns/042105LETTERSAPRIL21.cfm