President promotes domestic agenda

DETROIT -- President Bush promoted his entire domestic agenda Tuesday -- from a massive Social Security overhaul to a new, austere budget -- as changes needed for faster job growth and a solid economic expansion.\nBush addressed the Detroit Economic Club but also aimed his comments at Congress, where some of his proposals face bipartisan resistance. He defended the cuts and restraints in the $2.57 trillion proposal he sent Monday to Capitol Hill.\n"Now Congress needs to join with me to bring real spending discipline to the federal budget," Bush said. "It is essential that those who spend the money in Washington adhere to this principle: A taxpayer dollar ought to be spent wisely or not spent at all."\nSpeaking in the manufacturing center of Detroit, Bush ran through his list of domestic priorities, pressing Congress to make past tax cuts permanent, add private accounts to Social Security, curb lawsuit awards to plaintiffs, allow small businesses to pool health insurance purchases, approve his energy plan, create a guest worker program for illegal immigrants, require testing of high school students and simplify the tax code -- all to help make the country more competitive in the global marketplace.\n"We're moving forward with an ambitious agenda to ensure that our economy remains the freest, the most flexible and the most prosperous in the world," he said.\nAlthough economic recovery has become more firmly entrenched in the United States and America's payrolls are growing, the nation's job market is improving only at a sluggish pace.\nBut with his re-election won and job-creation numbers finally in positive territory during his time in office, the president has moved from the defensive to the offensive on the topic. He portrayed his spending plan as a centerpiece of his prescription for prosperity.\n"Leaders in Congress and in the business sector have expressed their concerns about federal spending, and I've listened," he said.\nAs Bush spoke, his Treasury secretary, John Snow, and budget office chief, Joshua Bolten, were on Capitol Hill facing tough questioning from Democrats. Some Republicans, too, have greeted the document with skepticism; some would like to see tighter spending controls and some favor programs slated for cuts. GOP leaders called the president's proposal merely a "starting point."\nBush's request for the budget year that begins Oct. 1 would boost spending on the military and homeland security but would slash programs benefiting farmers, education, the environment, the poor, veterans and others, each with benefactors in Congress and elsewhere who are sure to fight such cuts.\nThe president called his budget plan disciplined, saying it shows "us on track to cut the deficit in half by 2009," even though it does so in part by leaving out massive expected spending on the Iraq war, the transition to private accounts in Social Security and some tax cuts.\nHe also argued that protecting America "imposes costs that are large" and requires policy-makers to "show even more discipline about spending in other areas."\nIn particular, after being criticized for recommending elimination or stark reductions in several programs that benefit low-income Americans, Bush took pains to explain his rationale for wanting to end a $225 million literacy program, Even Start, to show he is being sensible -- not callous.\n"I can't think of anybody in the Congress who is not for helping low-income families become literate," Bush said, but three evaluations concluded that "the program is not succeeding."\n"Families in Even Start have made no progress toward literacy, no more progress than a similar group of families outside the program," he said. "Every government program was created with good intentions, but not all are matching good intentions with good results."\nBut Scott Himelstein, head of the National Even Start Association, said the program that serves 120,000 poor children and families has been shown to work in local, state and independent evaluations. The president's criticism is misleading, Himelstein said, noting Bush's own Education Department has said the population served by Even Start is more complex than that served by any other federal education program.\n"So when the president says he's comparing a similar group of folks, he's contradicting what the U.S. Department of Education says," Himelstein said.