In the last six years George Bush and his rubber-stamp Republican Congress have waged class warfare against working Americans, pandering to the ultra-rich while at the same time repressing the income of working class Americans.
Our current Representative Zach Wamp has consistently opposed and lobbied against increases in the minimum wage while supporting tax giveaways for millionaires and increases in his own salary.
The minimum wage had not been increased since 1997. In that same period, Mr. Wamp had given himself eight salary increases totaling more than 35,000 dollars!
The number of Americans living in poverty decreased during the Clinton years, but has increased rapidly under the Bush administration. When Bush took office, thirty million Americans lived in poverty. Now six years later, thirty-five million Americans live in poverty, and the gap between the rich and the poor steadily grows.
In fact, of all the states Tennessee has one of the largest gaps between the rich and the poor, and also one of the largest gaps between the rich and the middle class. Tennessee ranks in the top five in both categories! In addition the gap is growing faster in Tennessee than in any other state.
Alan Greenspan says this increasing gap between the rich and the poor is a grave threat to “democratic capitalism.”
But these facts Mr. Wamp chooses to avoid or ignore as he tries to convince the people of the third district that our economy is thriving and that working Americans are better off than ever.
If our congressman really cared about the people of Tennessee and the third district, these economic problems would be a priority for him. Instead, he showed his true colors when he appeared on C-SPAN Friday night and literally crowed about how the Republicans had “out-foxed” the Democrats by attaching a poison pill to the bill to increase the minimum wage.
This poison pill is in the form of repealing the estate tax.
This poison pill will be a bonanza for Paris Hilton and her ilk, who will receive an 800 billion dollar gift from US taxpayers, while the US Treasury is stripped of 800 billion dollars which will be added to the 8.4 TRILLION dollar national debt that Wamp helped Bush create.
Wamp’s callous and reckless disregard of working families in his effort to line the pockets of his super rich donors is an affront to American values and is, simply put, just plain wrong.
Playing politics with the wages of working Americans reveals that Wamp is a values-hypocrite whose sense of morality has been compromised.
I’m one of the “Veterans for a Secure America,” running for US Congress in the third district of Tennessee. I’m running a grassroots campaign against a long-term Republican incumbent who has chosen not to honor his term limit pledge of twelve years ago. Please visit my website, Terry in ’06, and help take America back! I need and very much appreciate your support!
