The more flexible... the more easily screwed

You can usually tell when the Bush Administration is getting ready to screw someone over. Suddenly they want "greater flexibility" in a government program, leaving decisions up to those who are shielded by their respective departments. "Greater flexibility" is code for "Do what you want to the public. We'll look the other way". Case in point. Cut taxes on the rich, take more from the poor:

The Bush administration is proposing to increase rents charged to thousands of poor people who receive federal housing aid.

The increase would be accomplished by changing three little words in federal law. The minimum rent for tenants, which is "not more than $50" a month under current law, would have to be "at least $50" a month under President Bush's plan.

In budget documents sent to Congress last week, the administration said the proposal was "intended to promote work" by people who live in federally subsidized housing.

Some local authorities have a minimum rent of zero or $25 a month. Under Mr. Bush's proposal, they would have to charge $50 a month and could set the minimum much higher for some or all tenants.

Housing officials in New York, Philadelphia and Tacoma, Wash., said they did not have minimum rents. On average, they said, tenants pay 30 percent of their incomes in rent for their subsidized units.

The proposal is the latest example of what critics describe as onerous requirements placed on poor people by Mr. Bush's budget. Under it, families would face more difficulties in obtaining hardship exemptions from the minimum rent requirement.

Then...here it comes:

An assistant secretary of housing and urban development, Michael Liu, said today that the minimum rent proposal was "a reasonable way to promote work and responsibility."

Mr. Liu said some people who lived in public housing or received rental aid in the form of Section 8 vouchers could afford to pay much more than $50 a month.

"We wanted to provide flexibility to the local housing authorities," he said.

...and then there is this:

Local agencies might need to raise rents because Washington recently told them that their operating subsidies could be cut by up to 30 percent in the first quarter of this year. Federal officials said the cuts might be necessary because of a $250 million shortfall that resulted from government accounting errors and miscalculations.

Remember when they said that the "grown-ups" were back in charge? What kind of grown-up puts people on the street so they can have a nice shiny war to get re-elected? What kind of grown-up gives the money that they take away from housing and gives it to churches so they can build...more churches? If you didn't already know that the Bush Administration was made up of some the most evil bastards to ever roam the Earth...welcome to the new reality. The terrorists have not only won, they're running the government.