Sandy Teaches a Lesson
Bill Day, Cagle Cartoons
WASHINGTON — Back when he was being “severely conservative,” Mitt Romney suggested that responsibility for disaster relief should be taken from the big, bad federal government and given to the states, or perhaps even privatized. Hurricane Sandy would like to know if he’d care to reconsider.
The absurd — and dangerous — policy prescription came in a GOP primary debate in June. Moderator John King said he had recently visited communities affected by severe weather, and noted that the Federal Emergency Management Agency “is about to run out of money.”
“There are some people … who say, you know, maybe we’re learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role,” King said. “How do you deal with something like that?”
Romney replied: “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 further and send it back to the private sector, that’s even better.”
Romney went on to express the general principle that, given the crushing national debt, “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?’”
King gave him a chance to back off: “Including disaster relief, though?”
Romney didn’t blink. “We cannot — we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids,” he said, adding that “it is simply immoral … to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids.”
Now, with an unprecedented and monstrous storm bashing the East Coast, this glib exercise in ideological purity is newly relevant. Was Romney really saying that the federal government should abdicate the task of responding to natural disasters such as the one now taking place? Yes, he was. Did he really mean it? Well, with Romney, that’s always another question.
As the legendary Watergate source Deep Throat never actually said: “Follow the money.”
The dishonest “solution” proposed by Romney and running mate Paul Ryan for the federal government’s budget woes relies largely on a shell game: Transfer unfunded liabilities to the states.
Most disastrously, this is what Romney and Ryan propose for Medicaid, the health care program for the poor. The GOP plan would give the states block grants that would not begin to cover Medicaid’s rising costs. Governors and legislatures would be forced to impose draconian cuts, with potentially catastrophic impact for millions of Americans. Medicaid’s most expensive role — and thus, under Romney, the most imperiled — is to fund nursing home care for seniors who classify as “poor” only because they have exhausted their life savings.
Transferring the onus of Medicaid and other programs to the states would save money only by making it impossible to provide services at current levels. For the hard-right ideologues who control the Republican Party, this would be a good thing. Our society has become too dependent on government, they believe, too “entitled” to benefits; we are unwilling to “take personal responsibility and care for” our lives, as Romney said in his secretly recorded “47 percent” speech.
Romney’s budget proposals would end all this coddling — except for the Pentagon and its contractors, who would get a big boost in federal largess, and of course, the wealthy, who would get a huge tax cut.
So-called “discretionary” federal spending would be sharply reduced. This would include spending for such agencies as FEMA. So yes, even if Romney was just pandering to the right-wing base at that June debate, one consequence of his policies would be to squeeze funding for federal emergency relief.
I guess having to survive a few hurricanes, tornados and earthquakes on our own would certainly foster personal responsibility.
And by the way, why is it that we’re having such a huge hurricane make landfall in such an unusual place at such a late date in the season? Is this another of those freakish once-in-a-century weather events that seem to be happening so often these days?
I know it’s impossible to definitively blame any one storm on human-induced atmospheric warming. But I’m sorry, these off-the-charts phenomena are becoming awfully commonplace. By the time scientists definitively establish what’s happening, it will be too late.
As has been noted, the words “climate change” were not spoken during the presidential debates. It was an omission we should sorely regret.
Eugene Robinson’s email address is eugenerobinson@washpost.com. (c) 2012, Washington Post Writers Group
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There is no “daylight” between Mitt Romney and those who wish to eliminate even those things a government is supposed to do and can do more efficiently than private contractors. Some think the federal government shouldn’t exist to see to the safety, health and welfare of its citizens in disasters like fires, hurricanes and floods, but only to defend us from harm from enemies foreign and domestic. To see this as short-sighted is an understatement. Ask the governors of those states affected by a disaster, even the Republican ones.
From the NYT:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/opinion/a-big-storm-requires-big-government.html?_r=1&
Just my opinion: If Mitt Romney wins this election, it will not be due to his accomplishments and vision for our country but rather the dire indication of the sickness of the American soul that could elected someone such as this…..
And my opinion is that if Obama wins reelection, it will not be due to his accompliahments and vision but rather due to the trashing of his opponent .
Of concern is whether there is any hope of the country uniting, no matter what the outcome of the election.
CS
I see little hope of the country uniting when the parties are going in opposite directions. There may be enough agreement in the center to get some things done, but when the GOP is intent on dismantling the entire safety net constructed over the past 80 years, we can hardly fault the Dems for disagreeing with them.
When that center is diminished to the point of little more than token agreement, there will be a major upheaval and a new system put into place. I hope it’s a parlimentary system, though I won’t be around to see it.
Both sides consider the other to be dismantling, TO. The truth is that policies of the past have now reached their breaking point and the system will either be dismantled or will crash down of its own weight. Instead of facing up to that, each party and its followers have been pointing fingers and fearmongering over what “they” will do.
CS
What do the GOP consider the Dems to be dismantling?
Dismantling isn’t really the right word for it from the conservative side….i guess transforming from the default position of limited powers of the federal govt to a much broader view of those powers, as well as a more distributive role for taxation (a la the social democrats of Europe.)
I’m not making the argument that this is a correct view…certainly not 100% accurate and even less accurate to think that the GOP represents small govt. the point is though that I can at least recognize why people on the right see it this way, and that this is why they feel that the GOP is justified in opposing the Democratic plans (the flip side of your view that Dems can’t be faulted for opposing GOP plans.)
I understand. Do you think that the rise of the Tea Party has speeded up the process of narrowing the middle agreement area? It seems to me that they are the catalyst for both sides to move precipitately away from each other.
The public has generally been more in the middle and that’s probably why Congress has a 14% approval rating. It’s a wonder to me that a third party doesn’t gain more traction, unless the Tea Party is the one that will be able to do it. Too bad they were co-opted by the right-wing of the GOP. I’m sure the serious ones are pretty bitter about that.
Well i think a lot ofmpolitical neophytes came out for the Tea Party, and while that can be good for breaking the hold that party operatives have it also brings a lot of downside. The Tea Party consists of a lot of older voters who became energized and on the left you have a lot of youth who have become more political as a result of the wars and the Obama phenomenon. While it’s good for people to get involved, the people who were formerly uninformed are largely now misinformed, because they’re so easily manipulated.
Christy and Obamama are working in tandem to get NJ through this disaster.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/41117_NJ_Gov._Christie_Praises_Obamas_Response_to_Hurricane_Sandy-_Outstanding
Fox News and Mittens treat it as a photo op.
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/10/30/typical-romney/
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/in-wake-of-storm-christie-breaks-from-attacks-to-praise-obama/
” Mr Romney not only believes that states acting independantly can handle the response,but that profit making companies can do an even better job” (Paraphrased for brevity). Well, it is true that racking up more debt for the nation isn’t the best course of action. But I certainly disagree with profit making companies taking over the job of responding in such emergencies. Lets see..do the states contract these companies like road and bridge repairs are contracted? Will these companies BE there to hand out water and rescue people from roof tops, help keep order and deal with looting? Somehow I don’t think so. For one thing THEY COULD GET SUED! ( Something most companies really abhor) Or do they just come in for the clean up? Well..who needs them then. People do it by themselves now, with the help of neighbors and others.
Here is a comment that will undoubtedly rankle our conservative friends, but Romney is absolutley obsessed with making money. His whole approach to everything is privatization. Capitalism can only go so far Mitt. He wanted the private sector to take over the auto industry and now he wants them to take over the “national disaster” business. His whole 20 mil dollar a year world revolves around money, and I’m sure he can take care of just about anything that comes up in life with all of it..but the rest of can’t. We need a smattering of social programs to help us live in this profit dominated world he imagines.
Sheknows, FWIW your comment doesn’t rankle me…i think there are legitimate criticisms to be made about privitization of those kinds of activities, and at very least conservatives are wrong when they make this a black and white issue (as in, all privatization is good.)
What I do find highly questionable in your comment though is the statement about Romney “wanting the private sector to take over the auto industry.” the private sector can’t “take over” what is already the private sector. It’s true that Romney and most conservatives opposed the takeover of the companies by the public sector…but rather wierd that you phrased it with the default the other way around.
Just meant to say that instead of the govt. stepping in to give financial assistance, Romney favored letting them go bankrupt ( to decrease the added expenditures of pensions, retirement plans, excess employees etc) and then turning it back over to private investors to pick up.