24/7 Ideology Battle Continues as It Is Serious Asked: Do We Really Need A National Weather Service?
Aug 28th, 2011 | 15 responses
First we had Republican Ron Paul questioning whether FEMA is necessary and now via the Fox News website here’s this piece asking whether we need a National Weather Service. I strongly feel that these kinds of stories and removing the “givens” that most mainstream Americans assumed where there to help is going to hurt the Republican Party with independent voters over the long run. Whoever thought we would see the day when we’d see something like this except in The Onion or a series of Andy Borowitz Tweets?
As Hurricane Irene bears down on the East Coast, news stations bombard our televisions with constant updates from the National Hurricane Center.
While Americans ought to prepare for the coming storm, federal dollars need not subsidize their preparations. Although it might sound outrageous, the truth is that the National Hurricane Center and its parent agency, the National Weather Service, are relics from America’s past that have actually outlived their usefulness.
Oh.
The National Weather Service (NWS) was founded in 1870. Originally, the NWS was not a public information agency. It was a national security agency and placed under the Department of War. The Service’s national security function has long since disappeared, but as agencies often do, however, it stuck around and managed to increase its budget.
Today the NWS justifies itself on public interest grounds. It issues severe weather advisories and hijacks local radio and television stations to get the message out. It presumes that citizens do not pay attention to the weather and so it must force important, perhaps lifesaving, information upon them. A few seconds’ thought reveals how silly this is. The weather might be the subject people care most about on a daily basis. There is a very successful private TV channel dedicated to it, 24 hours a day, as well as any number of phone and PC apps. Americans need not be forced to turn over part of their earnings to support weather reporting.The NWS claims that it supports industries like aviation and shipping, but if they provide a valuable contribution to business, it stands to reason business would willingly support their services. If that is the case, the Service is just corporate welfare. If they would not, it is just a waste.
Corporate welfare? This sounds as if George W. Bush, Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan who didn’t point this out were enablers.
As for hurricanes, the insurance industry has a compelling interest in understanding
them. In a world without a National Weather Service, the insurance industry would probably have sponsored something very like the National Hurricane Center at one or more universities. Those replacements would also not be exploited for political purposes.
As it stands today, the public is forced to pay more than $1 billion per year for the NWS. With the federal deficit exceeding a trillion dollars, the NWS is easily overlooked, but it shouldn’t be. It may actually be dangerous.
Read it in full. Yes, it is reasoned, it has an argument.
But the bottom line is: this is not simply “outrageous” but politically way out of the mainstream and if you asked most Americans about axing or cutting way back on the National Weather Service they would say: “You’ve got to be kidding!”
And if a Presidential candidate was asked about this and endorsed the idea they could kiss not just independent voters but many thoughtful Republicans good bye. But what does any of this matter when everything because a battle ground in a 24/7 ideological battle?
Steve Benen has an interesting reaction to this and some other storm related assertions:
The Fox News piece touts private outlets, including AccuWeather, without alerting readers to a key detail: these private outlets rely on information they receive from the National Weather Service. Indeed, the NWS makes this information available to the private sector for free, since the NWS is a public agency and the data it compiles is public information.
The Fox News item goes on to say, in reference to the Weather Service, “It issues severe weather advisories and hijacks local radio and television stations to get the message out. It presumes that citizens do not pay attention to the weather and so it must force important, perhaps lifesaving, information upon them.”
This is not, by the way, a parody.
Glenn Beck, meanwhile, told his radio audience on Friday that Hurricane Irene “a blessing. It is God reminding you — as was the earthquake last week — it’s God reminding you you’re not in control. Things can happen.”
This divine “blessing” has already killed at least eight people.
Dr. Ryan N. Maue writing on Watts Up with That in a post that needs to be read in full:
With the ongoing Hurricane Irene, let me discuss how these supposedly useless government funded forecasts are being used. First, in order to generate the best possible initial conditions for tropical storm track, and the entire weather model forecast, we need lots of data both in-situ (stations, balloons, aircraft), as well as satellite remote sensing. This is not only a nationwide effort but a truly global scale endeavor. If we do not know the initial conditions over China, our 5-day forecasts over the west coast would be considerably worse. Similarly, if the government funded reconnaissance flights from the military and NOAA did not fly through Irene or sample the environment around the storm, our track and intensity forecasts would be worse, a lot worse.
NOAA, the NWS, and the National Hurricane Center have coordinated for decades with universities and other government labs to develop the best possible data assimilation and mathematical modeling techniques. The national research and operations infrastructure developed, maintained, and advanced using government funding is truly something to be prideful about in America.
Suggesting that insurance companies or other private entities would have come up with this sort of infrastructure is fantastical and exhibits ignorance of the military-scale coordination necessary for the entire system to work. Since the private corporations are taxpayers as well, they are justified in making use of the government subsidized data network including satellites and supercomputer weather forecasts — and adding value for their particular sector of the economy. While food stamps and unemployment checks may be the best way for the Obama administration to stimulate the economy, I’d argue that providing the best forecasts, technology, and expertise in weather is one of the best fiscal multipliers out there aside from the threat of space alien attacks.
If given the choice between organizations such as Fox News who have a history of distorting the truth and lying versus scientists from the US government, who are you going to choose?
15 Responses to “24/7 Ideology Battle Continues as It Is Serious Asked: Do We Really Need A National Weather Service?”
Total morons. I’ve had it with these jerks. I’m not even going to argue the inanity of their points anymore.
I must admit that I would cut this before I would cut Social Security, Medicare, or welfare.
I would cut this before I would cut either.
http://www07.grants.gov/aboutgrants/about_grants_gov.jsp
There is half a trillion a year.
The rumor that a Patent Office official resigned and recommended that the Patent Office be closed because he thought that everything that could possibly be invented had already been invented has been shown to be a false ‘rumor.’
Unfortunately these “big thinkers / big budget savers” on the right (wrong?) are taking themselves seriously and trying to get others to buy in on this foolishness.
Heaven help us… Weather permitting of course.
Yes, they were. What Paul is trying to do is make people think about priorities, and face questions that didn’t seem important before. The debt is building with little hope to control it. The only way that it can be brought under control is for every program to be thought out from scratch.
The fact that it’s important doesn’t mean that it has to be done by the federal government. If there’s a way to do it privately, then it should be.
But that’s the problem. When something has been done the same way for decades on end, people assume that it HAS to be done that way, or at least that it’s normal.
If the NWS should be a federal agency, then lay out the reasonable points to support that argument, and let’s discuss that.
Just think. Our country is run by the brightest of the bright.
Obama, Biden, Perry, Bachmann, Reid, Pelosi, Palin, Romney, Boehner, Paul, Gingrich…Add their IQ’s together and you have one smart person. How could we want anyone more intelligent?
ProfElwood said:
Dr. Ryan N. Maue layed it out pretty well. In short without the NWS there would be no weather forecasting.
Prof- It is actually rather simple. The NWS protects the national interests that defend the nation and the population as well. Pulling the plug and moving to a model in which the federal gov was dependent on outside parties to inform them of weather based dangers would put national security at risk.
We wouldnt know when to move warships out of the way of impending storms. We wouldnt know when to tie down planes and other things that are done to protect our national defense infrastructure and worse yet we could not warn the population, that is the very backbone of our national defense since they are our workers and soldiers, of impending disaster.
We can debate different methods to be used in the case of FEMA but the NWS is directly tied to national defense and security which IS in fact plainly laid out in the constitution as the fed govs job.
Why is it a danger to have a for profit corp entity do the job you ask? Well imagine this, did you ever notice how any storm or danger is hyped by the media? Have you noticed how the commercials during that hyping often tie directly to things that someone in fear of danger may wish to spend money on in a paranoid spending frenzy? Imagine they had the power to accidentally “misread” the power of hurricanes. Now you have people rushing to the store to stock up for nothing and after a few events they stop. When something bad does happen they are caught off guard having long since stopped listening to the “cry wolf” channels that exist purely to fuel ad revenue and sell merchandise primarily based on human fear. Now imagine the effect this would have on our ability to defend ourselves against outside interests if say China bought the company that gives us our weather news. See if they do not tell us they open an easy path to invasion in the area effected. I think you get the idea of the many problems with getting rid of the NWS now.
The reason most people do not want to go into detail and explain why is because the reasons on this one are extremely plain and obvious.
To put it in short form. We are thrashing about trying to cut and gut and get rid of things and programs that ARE OBVIOUSLY in the national interest and have served the national interest for decades because we refuse as a nation to cut defense and fix medicare/caid and SS. One of the major reasons for this is because one party wants to spend on defense exclusively in an attempt to backdoor into gutting and scrapping programs that are highly popular that run counter to their ideology(preferably forced upon a Dem POTUS so they can have cover). If the starting points in discussions are no program and anything the program can grow to no compromise can exist. If the Dems admit that things as they stand are unsustainable and must be fixed the GOP uses it as a talking point as to why it should be scrapped or privatized hence the stalemate(before you do the why blame the GOP trick many examples of this game exist). When both parties truly want to fix them and the only debate is over how we will suddenly fix the programs. Until then we will go bankrupt or continue to gut everything but them because the GOP wants to win a 40 year fight and the Dems know that whispering about reality will merely give the GOP ammo.
In short we are still having the state power versus federal power debate 80 years later even though majorities throughout that entire period come down on the federalist side on almost every issue. If we can move on to a new discussion for once things might actually…I dont know…improve and get resolved.
Finally this is akin to the British parliament continuing to have a major debate between monarchy and parliamentary forms of gov or between catholic or protestant religious affiliation.
Can we pretty, pretty please move on to the now instead of what Lincoln did wrong.
I was sincere in the request, because knee-jerk reactions don’t impress me. “You’re nuts!” and “PEOPLE WILL SCREAM!” aren’t logical arguments.
Thanks Ron and TMSF.
Prof- I will say that I think we NEED such conversations we just need them on many topics to allow us to move on.
My issue is that never moving on is our current problem but in fairness we have yet to have discussion on the nitpicky small issues like the net good of the NWS.
We desperately need an open discussion on the net good of all federal concepts BUT it would need to be predicated on actually moving on once the masses have decided. What we have now is one group trying to build into infinity what many prefer on a smaller federal scale while the other group tries to prove that the federal scale is the problem regardless of the publics wishes and desires. That should be the stuff of political theory that only rises to the national stage once a large enough amount of the public supports it. Right now it is a game of convince, force and trick the public while those that vote for you believe you are trying to keep it sustainable when you are actually trying to end it that is a problem(of course as we saw in the W years once in power they run from it in the hope of keeping power which is equally problematic).
For example the argument that the ACA will result in single payer because it is unsustainable seems to ignore that is only true if it remains unsustainable. Make it sustainable and we never move to single payer. Of course to make it sustainable though means it will never go away and that is the discussion one group really wants to have. They can have that discussion but the price is unsustainable programs since fixing them is not an option(medicare Part D is not an accident it is the GOP trying to make a program unsustainable to nuke it like the ACA is a program to get us to single payer, both sides play the game but the programs are desired by the public it is scale that should be in question).
We could have sustainable programs between the two parties but we prefer to have a century old debate. In a similar manner we could have a discussion of what fed programs we truly desire and need but not if the end goal of one group is none regardless of the publics view. It is akin to democracy in reverse in that it cares not for the views of voters but merely a path to achieve set and defined goals.
@TMSF
I don’t think that Medicare part D was meant to hurt medical care. It makes much more sense that it was a giveaway to Phrma for favorable campaign donations, which is the norm for DC. Yes, these programs always hurt the public, but it just seems sort of conspiracy-ish to think that’s the part that they wanted.
I also believe that every organization needs a good inspection/cleanup on occasion, which is why I’d like to see more “sunset” provisions in laws, to force an occasional review of whether an agency’s methods and organization match its goals.
As to your “democracy in reverse” point, it’s part a long and usually slow decline. The founders wrote a good document for the time, but it didn’t cover everything that could go wrong. Maybe we’ll get the chance to try again when Mars is colonized.
Absalon-That is actually not in anyway what Prof is.
Prof-Do you also think that the ACA was created purely to create a sustainable system and NOT to result in single payer?
Mostly inquiring to see if you do not believe the conspiracy version on either side or just the GOP’s brand of it.
Personally I do believe the conspiracy version that suits either sides ideology finally being realized. For support on the right side I only need to look to Norquist and the Golden Straightjacket that we are currently struggling against which he did set the description of in the Reagan era. Seeing it from such a view doesnt make a person feel good about our pols and their true desires but it does go a long way in explaining what otherwise makes little sense.
@TMSF
Oh sure, there are advocates that have their own agendas, but they don’t have to be picked up by the legislators. In order to get something passed, you have to define the benefit to the legislators. Increased campaign donations to the legislators or the party can do that. Mr. Norquist wouldn’t have a bit of influence if the legislators ignored or rebuked him.
It’s not the promise of what you’ll do in the future that counts, but the record of what you’ve done in the past.
Prof-They cant ignore him. If they do no campaign money for them and the guy that they replace them with will be bought and paid for. This is reality though we do not like to think about it. Those think tanks and little known side actors like Norquist hold real power and when he lays out the golden straight jacket and we follow that path or when the policy for a new american century is presented and we go on a war spree this is not by accident but by design. It is nice to think that gov works like a brainless golem randomly moving to and fro but if that is the case men like Norquist are merely psychics predicting the future and I have my doubts. The easiest explanation is that yes we were bankrupting gov to drown it in the bathtub to finally go back to a states rights model, much like our military adventurism was intended to kick off a second american century. Does this paint a dark picture of those in charge, yes of course it does but again reality tends to be rather dark.