I had time to check more email today, and thought I'd pass on this little gem from (my favorite Texan, next to Molly Ivins) Jim Hightower:

A LUXURIOUS HOLIDAY
1/30/2004

I have wonderful news for you: George W's latest tax cuts are working! They're now being credited with having produced a bonanza of consumer buying in the recent holiday season!

What? You say you didn't get enough of a tax cut even to notice, much less enjoy a bonanza of consumerism? You say that job losses and low wages actually forced your family to cut back on holiday spending? You say that sales clerks at stores where you shop were complaining about slow and low sales?

Well, Bucko, that's because you don't shop at the right places! While the overall merchant scene was pretty Grinchy this season, with such outfits as Wal-Mart and Target showing disappointing results, things were a lot merrier at your high-end stores. Neiman Marcus, Tiffany, and Saks Fifth Avenue were among the purveyors of luxury goods that enjoyed booming sales to the Cadillac and Hummer crowd.

And why not, dears? After all, this is the crowd that took the bulk of Bush's tax giveaways. While a typical family might have gotten a $600 tax cut, if they were lucky, the millionaire families averaged $93,000 each in cuts. That'll buy a lot of baubles and gewgaws.

This is why the CEO of Neiman Marcus exulted that holiday shoppers in his swank stores "proved that luxury is alive." Indeed sales of such stocking stuffers as $5,000-to-$10,000 watches were up 16 percent this season over last! There were similar jumps in diamonds, gold and cashmere goods, and Neiman reported that sales of Chanel, Prada, and Gucci handbags were "absolutely miraculous."

Actually, there's nothing miraculous about it. When the president takes cold cash out of the public treasury and hands it to the high rollers, they do what the high rollers do – roll out the Escalade and go to Neimans.

The holiday shopping results offer a perfect picture of Bush's policies: The rich get richer... and everybody else cuts back.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


"At the Luxury End, Holiday Sales Were Hopping," The New York Times. January 9, 2004.






Jim Hightower
Hightower & Associates
1802 W. 6th Street
Austin, TX 78703
512-477-5588
info@jimhightower.com

  ¶ 4:57 PM

  GREETINGS FROM NEW MEXICO!

I'm having a great time here in Red River with my brother and his family... the kids are GREAT! Little Kade is crawling like all get-out now, Briannah can talk and apply her own lip gloss (her puzzlement at my looks of horror when she tries to get me to gloss myself will hopefully someday result in her abandoning all forms of glitter and gloss... I hope!), and Shane is having his 7th birthday! (The party was today, the actual birthday, tomorrow.)

Shane's party was a ski party, and Shannon spent a couple of days building a 4-layer cake in the shape of a snow-covered mountain, complete with lemon-cake ski slopes and chocolate skiers, and evergreens made of ice-cream-cones and artfully applied green frosting. I helped, and my help did not ruin the result. I have astounding, truly ASTOUNDING photos of this culinary masterpiece, but alas, I cannot yet post them (soon, soon), and also shocking pictures of the "environmental devastation" that occurred once the fair mountainside was strip-mined for its moist and delicious under-frost cake... mmmm cake.

Yesterday we spent a productive few hours in Taos, putting Howard Dean flyers and pamphlets under every windshield wiper we could find (and in Shane's case, reach -- he had to reach high for the SUV's, but he was a real pro!), and then we went around Taos posting Howard Dean signs at intersections traveled by locals.

As much fun as I'm having, it looks like my trip might have to be cut a day short by the weather: ice storms and "wintery mix" (weather channel slang for the 4th circle of HELL) are forecast for every day this week except tuesday and friday, so it's one or the other, and I don't think friday will give me long enough in f-ville. So tuesday it is!

I'm having a really great time on my trip, but I miss my Brian something awful. It's hard spending days without his sweet kisses. I love you, Brian. xoxoxoxoxo

I will post photos of cakes and Dean signs and other such wonders as soon as possible! I hope to see you soon!!

PS: in every public bathroom I meet, from SF to SoFla: TV NEWS LIES. Become the media, and pass it on!  ¶ 9:46 PM