Romney would have cut funding for FEMA if he were President...

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

(Mitt Romney is trying to weather) the fallout from his suggestion during the G.O.P. primaries that he was in favor of dismantling federal emergency management and privatizing relief efforts. At a CNN debate in June, 2011, the moderator John King engaged the candidates in a discussion about the role of government. When he got to Romney, the exchange went like this:

KING: What else, Governor Romney? You’ve been a chief executive of a state. I was just in Joplin, Missouri. I’ve been in Mississippi and Louisiana and Tennessee and other communities dealing with whether it’s the tornadoes, the flooding, and worse. FEMA is about to run out of money, and there are some people who say do it on a case-by-case basis and some people who say, you know, maybe we’re learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role. How do you deal with something like that?

ROMNEY: Absolutely. Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.

Instead of thinking in the federal budget, what we should cut—we should ask ourselves the opposite question. What should we keep? We should take all of what we’re doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we’re doing that we don’t have to do? And those things we’ve got to stop doing, because we’re borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we’re taking in. We cannot…

KING: Including disaster relief, though?

ROMNEY: We cannot—we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we’ll all be dead and gone before it’s paid off. It makes no sense at all.

That seems pretty clear cut: FEMA and other federal disaster-relief efforts should be on list of things that should be eliminated in order to reduce the national debt.

Not surprisingly, in the past few days the Romney campaign has been busy rowing back from that position. When a reporter from the National Journal asked the Romney campaign about the candidate’s stance on disaster relief, a press spokeswoman e-mailed back: “Gov. Romney believes that states should be in charge of emergency management in responding to storms and other natural disasters in their jurisdictions. As the first responders, states are in the best position to aid affected individuals and communities, and to direct resources and assistance to where they are needed most. This includes help from the federal government and FEMA.”

So Romney is in favor of keeping FEMA, after all—or is he? On Monday afternoon, even before Sandy had hit, the editorial page of the Times invoked Romney’s 2011 comments in the debate and asked, “Does Mr. Romney really believe that financially strapped states would do a better job than a properly functioning federal agency? Who would make decisions about where to send federal aid? Or perhaps there would be no federal aid, and every state would bear the burden of billions of dollars in damages.” So far, the Obama campaign hasn’t adopted this mode of attack, probably because it doesn’t need to. With the President sticking to the line that the election is the furthest thing from his mind, it can rely on the media to make life even more difficult for Team Romney, which is clearly struggling to come up with a post-Sandy strategy.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/johncassidy/2012/10/romney-has-a-christie-problem-and-a-fema-problem.html#ixzz2AqudFMNO

Comments

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

When I heard the clip I assumed he meant making the states do it. Which of course would mean the states would have to increase taxes to pay for it. It would involve massive amounts of duplication, meaning overall taxes (and government) would be bigger.

[interdictor.livejournal.com]

FEMA does more harm than good during natural disasters. And Flip-Flop's position on FEMA and everything else is determined by his sticking his finger in the political winds. No one knows what he really believes on anything.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

So your position is that doing nothing would be better than having FEMA?

[ygrii-blop.livejournal.com]

Well, of course, because BIG GOVERNMENT SOCIALISM TAXES!

[interdictor.livejournal.com]

See, this is the problem with you people. You have boxed yourselves into a false dichotomy. FEMA sucked during Katrina. But, I called on Bush to bring in the active duty military to restore order -- you can read it on my blog.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

Some folk do have a certain mindset, true.

So let's just see how FEMA under Obama does, in comparison to FEMA under other presidents, shall we? My suspicion is that the agency will get more than 80% of things right, and just maybe the agency learned a lesson the hard way from Katrina. After all, if you chaps don't learn from your mistakes, you're doomed to repeat them.

Alas, there's no time for that between now and next Thursday. Such is.

[interdictor.livejournal.com]

FEMA made things worse during Katrina. Much worse. FEMA doing nothing would have been better,

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

So rather than fixing something you'd get rid of it?

I appreciate where you come from, Americans are constantly proving they are inadequate at self government.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that’s the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.

That's retarded and conservatives don't really believe it either. They're fine with federal income tax and the DEA raiding States with medical marijuana. Looking at situations like this where a huge storm affects multiple states and somehow the correct position of the national government is to let the states handle it individually? Has someone forgotten we're actually a country and not just 50 little fiefdoms?

Also, can you imagine if First Responders were privatized? Rescue services would appear and the first thing out of their mouths would be a fee schedule and asking if that will be cash or debit. "I'm sorry sir - you only have funds sufficient to rescue two family members and one pet."

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

That's retarded and conservatives don't really believe it either.

It's smart, and it's something I not only believe, but fully advocate.

Also, can you imagine if First Responders were privatized? Rescue services would appear and the first thing out of their mouths would be a fee schedule and asking if that will be cash or debit. "I'm sorry sir - you only have funds sufficient to rescue two family members and one pet."

The key words are "if you can." I'm not sure we can privatize first responders, unfortunately.

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure we can privatize first responders, unfortunately.

So, you agree with Fizzyland's comment, but not sure its possible.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I think we should if it's feasible, but I'm not sure how to go about it in an equitable manner.

[american-geist.livejournal.com]

Yes, how tragic some fat-cat won't be able to skim millions of dollars off the top of an essential service that the government does perfectly well at-cost.

Seriously, that's what privatization is about. It's a bunch of rich assholes who think they're entitled to extract capital from government services. Small government indeed.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

It's smart, and it's something I not only believe, but fully advocate.

Of course you do but that doesn't mean it isn't parochial and regressive. I understand the appeal of more local and hence, hypothetically more responsive government but the reality is that leaving major issues to State and local jurisdictions would be worse for everyone involved. Not to mention that the trend of human social development and our increasingly interconnected economies is taking us in the direction of larger-scale unions like the EU. 200 years from now we're far more likely to have World Government than we are the Sovereign State of Minnesota.

I'm trying to imagine your alternate universe news: Governor Christie thanks President Romney for Doing Nothing.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Parochial, sure, but that's the point. Localities know their needs better, and maybe Arizona need not be concerned with hurricane prep in Florida.

But regressive? I don't consider understanding our individual nature as regressive. And using the EU as an example here amuses me a bit, given the issues they're facing.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Be amused all you want - I could have cited the WTO, NAFTA, etc., the point being that short of a complete collapse of society, the direction we're moving toward is integration not parochial isolationism.

Arizona may not give a shit about Florida's hurricane prep but part of being a nation means that we don't ignore problems in our country just because they aren't happening in our back yard. And contributions to the whole mean that if and when Arizona has need, the resources will be there.

When did you become so profoundly cynical toward nation-states?

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

I could have cited the WTO, NAFTA, etc., the point being that short of a complete collapse of society, the direction we're moving toward is integration not parochial isolationism.

Except that things like the WTO exist to facilitate very specific goals, and don't include everyone. If anything, the NAFTA/WTO model is closer to my desired format.

When did you become so profoundly cynical toward nation-states?

It's not especially new, but it's taken a more significant role in my thinking over the last six years.

[icelore.livejournal.com]

I must have missed the "cartoon" part of this. Or maybe we were mistaken for politicaldialogues?

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

I don't know about "cartoon", but the story definitely involves a Muppet.

[brother-dour.livejournal.com]

Helping others. Now immoral.