Send Bush Packing on New CNA/NNOC Site

by Mike Hall, Dec 4, 2008

Most of us have—generally with some reluctance—agreed to help friends or acquaintances move, hauling furniture and boxes into a rental truck for trips across town or the country.

But if someone asked, “Want to help President Bush move out of the White House?” most of us would jump at the opportunity to send Bush packing. That’s exactly what the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC) is offering visitors to its new website www.sendbushpacking.com.

The site was inspired by Bush’s last-minute rush of rules and regulations, many of which will adversely impact health care services and workplace safety. It offers an interactive game highlighting some of the “midnight rules”—last-minute regulatory changes—the Bush administration is seeking to cement in place in its waning days.

Each moving box represents one of the many sneak attack rules—from health care cuts to toxic chemical exposure limits to family leave restrictions. As you drag and drop the box into the truck, you not only get an explanation of the new regulation, but occasionally a Bushism explanation, such as this gem about easing air pollution rules:

“It’s not the pollution that’s ruining the air, it’s impurities in the water and air.”

Says CNA/NNOC Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro:

On Nov. 4, American voters sent an emphatic signal that they want change from the policies of the past eight years. It is disgraceful that the Bush administration wants to squeeze in even more of its rejected practices in its final hours in office. Many of [the regulations] could seriously undermine access to care, workplace safety and workers’ rights, and the environmental safeguards Americans depend on.

Before you load Bush’s truck for the trip back to Texas, take a look at the list of regulations he’s trying to slam through:

• A reduction in outpatient services for low- and moderate-income people covered under Medicaid, likely to mean cuts in such basics as dental and vision care, diagnostic screenings for children, and lab and ambulance services.
• Reduced access for reproductive and family planning care through a new rule permitting workers to refuse to perform abortions, dispense birth control pills, or even provide emergency contraception in rape cases.
• More stringent rules on employees’ use of the Family and Medical Leave Act, which allows workers to take unpaid leave to take care of sick family members.
• Revised Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations that make it more difficult to limit on-the-job exposure to toxic chemicals.
• Numerous environmental changes that would permit oil and gas leases on public lands, more air pollution near national parks and forests, increased dumping by mining companies into streams and erosion of the Endangered Species Act.

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