House GOP scraps vote on Sandy aid

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Scott_Lafrance said:
What’s your point? Charity is only legitimate when it comes by force of government?
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You asked why a Virginian should have to contribute to the common good in a national emergency. The answer is human and national solidarity. We must stand together at times like this, as we New Yorkers stood by the Gulf states after Katrina. It is appropriate for both public and private channels of relief to be involved in this response, but your question and my answer were both more general than this. When one part of the country is devastated by a disaster, there is a moral obligation for other parts of the country to help out.

This would be true even if the region giving assistance had no fear of being subject to a similar disaster in the future, though obviously in the case of Virginia this is not the case, and so there is also a practical, selfish motivation for assisting other states in their time of need: to increase the likelihood that you will also get help in a similar disaster.
 
seekerz said:
And they only found out that was all in the bill last night? Seriously, now I can see Romney’s point about liking the ability to fire people! This is the height of incompetence and irresponsibility.
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Actually there has been an ongoing fight over this for while. The fact you haven’t been paying attention doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
 
stinkcat_14 said:
Especially, when they voted for Obama.
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Is this sarcasm? Obviously a huge number of New Yorkers (and New Jersians, or whatever the term is) did not vote for Obama. Indeed, one of the worst hit areas was the Republican-leaning Rockaways. Not that such partisan divides should discourage this kind of disaster assistance.

As I mentioned previously I do wonder how different the Republican response would be if the disaster happened in the region most of them are from.
 
SamH said:
What national emergency? Did something happen to Amtrak? Did the fisheries in Alaska get hit by Sandy?
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You’ve just changed the subject. You were wondering why Virginia should help out other states when they have experienced a disaster.

As I said in a previous post, if the Democrats have exploited the disaster and loaded this bill with pork then they are just as responsible for this Congressional failure as the Republicans.
 
ringil said:
Yes, I love it.
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The sooner we loose the facade of a Republic and move to a one party dictatorship, the sooner I can laugh out loud at all you clowns that still think this is the land of the free.
 
SamH said:
Actually there has been an ongoing fight over this for while. The fact you haven’t been paying attention doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
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Thanks for making assumptions, but since the so-called fight did not achieve a bill that could be passed, you have just underlined the case I’m making: incompetence and irresponsibility from people elected to actually DO stuff. Nowhere else, in any occupation or industry, would this level of dereliction of duty be considered acceptable.
 
seekerz said:
Thanks for making assumptions, but since the so-called fight did not achieve a bill that could be passed, you have just underlined the case I’m making: incompetence and irresponsibility from people elected to actually DO stuff. Nowhere else, in any occupation or industry, would this level of dereliction of duty be considered acceptable.
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So you admit my assumption is fact?
 
SamH said:
So you admit my assumption is fact?
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That I have not been following the so-called ‘fight’ over the Sandy bill? No, I was more interested in the ‘fiscal cliff’ fake drama, to be quite honest - so I did not acquaint myself with the finer details of the aid bill.

There are people who get elected to do that sort of thing - problem is, they don’t seem too well endowed in the work ethic department, if you know what I mean…From what I gather, their REAL job is to teach work ethics to “poor” people when they retire from Congress.
 
seekerz said:
There are people who get elected to do that sort of thing - problem is, they don’t seem too well endowed in the work ethic department, if you know what I mean…From what I gather, their REAL job is to teach work ethics to “poor” people.
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Actually they were doing what the leadership has told them - never let a crisis go to waste.
 
SamH said:
Actually they were doing what the leadership has told them - never let a crisis go to waste.
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You mean they actually listen to someone other than the specific people on whom their re-election depends?! :eek:
 
SamH said:
Why start now?
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Why indeed. If I could get paid for not working, and get my contract renewed repeatedly all the same maybe I’d get used to the idea of endless vacation too.
 
oldcelt said:
It sets out the general goals of the constitution. Not everything can be specifically written in or you end up with a document that is unworkable and useless like the Pennsylvania state constitution.

John
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Precisely. That’s why the framers designed the ability to amend the Constitution. Good design too since words in the English language change meanings all the time.
 
ProVobis said:
Precisely. That’s why the framers designed the ability to amend the Constitution. Good design too since words in the English language change meanings all the time.
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They should have written the Constitution in Latin. 😃
 
oldcelt said:
Peter King was just on Fox berating his own party…the Republicans are in complete disarray.

John
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I must congratulate the DNC on their effective -]agitprop/-] media savvy.

60% of this “emergency” spending doesn’t kick in until two years from now. And much is not hurricane relief-related:
“This is a preliminary list of questionable spending in the bill:
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•$2 million to repair damage to the roofs of museums in Washington, D.C., while many in Hurricane Sandy’s path still have no roof over their own heads.
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•$150 million for fisheries as far away from the storm’s path as Alaska.
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•$125 million for the Department of Agriculture’s Emergency Watershed Protection program, which helps restore watersheds damaged by wildfires and drought.
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•$20 million for a nationwide Water Resources Priorities Study.
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•$15 million for NASA facilities, though NASA itself has called its damage from the hurricane ‘minimal.’
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•$50 million in subsidies for tree planting on private properties.
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•$336 million for taxpayer-supported AMTRAK without any detailed plan for how the money will be spent.
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•$5.3 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers – more than the Corps’ annual budget – with no statement of priorities about how to spend the money.
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•$12.9 billion for future disaster mitigation activities and studies, without identifying a single way to pay for it.
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“All told, 64 percent of the $60.4 billion in ‘emergency’ spending in this legislation will not be spent for nearly two years.
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“Americans impacted by Hurricane Sandy deserve better than this. We look forward to working with our colleagues to address these issues on the floor of the Senate this week.”
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coburn.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ContentRecord_id=82c5222b-3bfd-4592-a29c-0f1f7bf4fdc9&ContentType_id=d741b7a7-7863-4223-9904-8cb9378aa03a&Group_id=7a55cb96-4639-4dac-8c0c-99a4a227bd3a

Perhaps we can amend the thread title to “House GOP scraps vote on Pork spending attached to Sandy Aid”?
 
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