The day after the President's annual message to this nation the front page of my hometown newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina was very telling.  The lead headline read: "Bush touts record, platform."  Just below that article ran another large headline: "State loses jobs for third straight year." Not since the Great Depression has South Carolina had three consecutive years of job loss, and many other citizens in states across this nation are facing similar headlines.  Yet, it is unclear if these headlines are making any impact on the current Administration.

The day before the State of the Union, Iowa Caucus participants ranked jobs and health care ahead of the war in Iraq as issues most important to them.  Still President Bush's State of the Union address was dominated by his need to make the case for his Administration's policies in Iraq.  He spent precious little time on domestic issues and gave little hope to assuage the concerns cited by most Americans.

In his speech, the President proposed a job-training program, and that may be a compassionate proposal to make.  But the practical policy is a job creation program.  President Bush has the worst job loss record of any presidency since Herbert Hoover, and African American unemployment is nearly double that of white joblessness.  His plan to help unemployed workers learn new job skills is a long overdue policy, but it doesn't curb the loss of manufacturing jobs that were once the backbone of our nation's economy. The President's policies of supporting free trade agreements and providing tax breaks to corporations that send their jobs abroad will insure that those job losses will continue to mount.

Job uncertainty and the lack of affordable and portable health care undermine many Americans financial security.  Older Americans especially face insecure futures with the rising costs of prescription drugs and corporate scandals that jeopardize retirement savings.  The only policy this Administration has offered to improve conditions is tax breaks to the extremely wealthy, which has resulted in ballooning deficits and has put our nation's financial security on shaky ground.

Personal security after 9/11/01 remains elusive as well.  Americans civil liberties are being trampled in the name of national security, and our first responders are not receiving the financial support that is needed to insure they are adequately prepared to protect public safety in the event of another attack on our homeland. 

The policies of this President have compromised the security all Americans seek.  The headlines tell the story.  This President plans to run on his record, and that record is epitomized by record job losses, lack of affordable health care, and an unsafe homeland and world since he took office. He should reconsider his out-of-this-world agenda and begin to focus on the concerns of real Americans. 

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