PURE BUSHISM

You're either with us or with the terrorists ... unless you run a big corporation, in which case, if you want to be both, hey, be our guest:

Despite the Bush administration's pledge to battle terrorist financing, the government's average penalty against companies doing business with countries listed as terrorist-sponsoring states fell sharply after the Sept. 11 attacks, an Associated Press analysis of federal records shows.

The average penalty for a company doing business with Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Sudan or Libya dropped nearly threefold, from more than $50,000 in the five years before the 2001 attacks to about $18,700 afterward, according to a computer-assisted analysis of federal records....

--AP/Yahoo News

Oh, and it's not just those states:

The average corporate penalty for doing business with Cuba was four times higher before the attacks. The pre-attack average penalty was nearly $98,000; the post-attack average was about $23,500. The State Department accuses Cuba of bankrolling some terrorist groups and sheltering members of Basque and Colombian terrorist organizations.

Meanwhile, the Bush White House made things worse for ordinary Cubans:

...Under the new policy ... Cuban-Americans may visit relatives in Cuba just once every three years, rather than every year. The definition of relatives also now excludes aunts, uncles and cousins, an affront to many Cubans' generous definition of family.

...Some 77 percent of South Florida Cubans have family back home, and about 100,000 of the 125,000 Americans who legally visit Cuba each year are Cubans, he said.

Most use the trips to ferry medicine, clothing and food. The new Bush rules would limit their luggage to 44 pounds and cut the amount each family could send to Cuba from $1,200 to $900 annually. More than half the Cuban Americans here send cash to relatives on the island, a total of $100-million per year....

This is pure Bushism -- ease the burden on fat cats while the powerless suffer.

(Link via Raw Story.)