Bush Budget Screws Women

I know the 'liberal media' has repeated these numbers but I thought they were worth one more mention:

Among the programs for women that are getting reduced funding this year: the Violence Against Women Act Prevention and Prosecution programs (cut by $29.5 million); the United Nations Development Fund for Women (funding slashed by more than two-thirds, from $2.5 million to $1 million); the Department of Labor's Women's Bureau (cut by $460,000); the Small Business Administration's Women's Business Centers (cut by $500,000); the Public Health Service's Office on Women's Health (cut by $72,000); the National Women's Business Council (cut by $7,000); and the Women's Educational Equity Act programs (eliminated entirely, after being funded at $2.96 million last year). And while the National Domestic Violence Hotline will get the same funding it got in 2006 ($3 million), the budget for actual battered women's shelters will get its budget trimmed by $1 million.

(There are a few bright spots for women in the Bush budget: It proposes $7.3 million for a Women's Justice and Empowerment initiative to prevent violence against women in Africa, while funding for programs to prevent human trafficking would be more than doubled to $8.5 million. Plus, the Middle East Partnership Initiative, part of whose mission is to encourage empowerment of women, got an extra $10 million.)

In FY 2007, $250 million will be provided for programs to support healthy marriages and responsible fatherhood -- which is good news, but in order to find that funding, the budget took money away from other family assistance funds, notably the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families high performance bonus and the Out-of-Wedlock Birth Reduction bonus.

In the preamble to this "economic blueprint," the president calls the budget "compassionate." There, don't you feel better?