It’s in their nature.

Blunt Wants Federal Government To Do More For Joplin

Kevin Killeen

May 26, 2011 11:53 AM

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) – Missouri Senator Roy Blunt says he’s asking the federal government to reimburse 100 percent of the cost to local governments dealing with the Joplin tornado aftermath….

….In a phone conference with reporters Thursday,  Blunt says he has asked Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to do more.

“I’m asking for 100 percent federal reimbursement to local governments,” Blunt said, “They’ve agreed to 75.   I think they have to come to a better number than that, and the right number, I think, would be 100 percent….”

Senator Roy Blunt (r) at the Governor’s Ham Breakfast at the Missouri State Fair in Sedalia, Missouri, August 2012.

The U.S. Senate vote on Hurricane/Super Storm Sandy relief:

Question: On Passage of the Bill (H.R. 152 )

Vote Number: 4 Vote Date: January 28, 2013, 06:09 PM

Required For Majority: 3/5 Vote Result: Bill Passed

Measure Number: H.R. 152 (Disaster Relief Appropriations Act, 2013 )

Measure Title: A bill making supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2013, and for other purposes.

[….]

Blunt (R-MO), Nay

McCaskill (D-MO), Yea

[emphasis in original]

And if the relief had been for Joplin, Missouri?

Jan 28 2013

Senator Blunt’s Statement On Sandy Supplemental

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Roy Blunt (Mo.) issued the following statement today after the Senate’s vote on a $50.5 billion disaster supplemental bill:

“When a disaster exceeds the ability of communities and states, I believe the federal government has a responsibility to help people rebuild. Federal aid is an important tool to help get people back on their feet by restoring the infrastructure that was in place before a disaster – not a chance for Congress to attach stimulus-type spending or fundamentally alter the way we respond to future tragedies.

“In Missouri, we’ve had our fair share of disasters over the past two years during major flooding events, drought, and several tornadoes – including a deadly EF-5 tornado that devastated the City of Joplin in 2011. Following these tragic events, Congress provided targeted disaster funding through a regular appropriations process.

“Unfortunately, we did not follow the same process after Superstorm Sandy. I voted against this bill because it rewrites the Stafford Act and moves us farther away from a viable, long-term solution for funding national disasters.”

# # #

Ah, it’s all about “the process”. Right. Tell that to the people in the Northeast.

Previously:

HR 41: there but for the grace of… (January 7, 2013)

HR 152: Hey, it’s not in my backyard… (January 15, 2013)

Today, via twitter, on relief for Hurricane/Super Storm Sandy:

MrJM ‏@misterjayem

RT @ForecastFacts Every R in AZ, CO, GA, IA, ID, KS, MD, MI, MN, MO, MT, NC, NE, NV, OR, SC, SD, TN, UT, WI, WY voted against #Sandy relief. 8:15 PM – 15 Jan 13

The vote in the U.S. House of Representatives:

FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 23

     H R 152      YEA-AND-NAY      15-Jan-2013      7:25 PM

     QUESTION:  On Passage

     BILL TITLE: Making supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2013, and for other purposes

               Yeas     Nays   NV

Republican 49      179      4

Democratic 192     1        7

—- YEAS    241 —

Clay

—- NAYS    180 —

Graves (MO)

Hartzler

Long

Luetkemeyer

Wagner

—- NOT VOTING    11 —

Cleaver

Emerson

[emphasis added]

In your backyard:

Rep. Vicky Hartzler (r): What, no hot meals? (May 26, 2011)

….Homes and businesses in Sedalia, Missouri, in the 4th Congressional, were damaged in yesterday’s tornado outbreak. The 4th Congressional District is represented by freshman Representative Vicky Hartzler (r) who has been silent about House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s (r) demand for budget offsets as a condition for the approval of disaster relief in Joplin, Missouri after Sunday’s devastating tornado.

Lo and behold, via Twitter:

@RepHartzler Rep. Vicky Hartzler

Just talked to Dave Clippart, Pettis Co.Emergency Mgmt. Dir. He confirmed substantial damage from today’s tornado & some injuries. 21 hours ago

@RepHartzler Rep. Vicky Hartzler

I have offered whatever help I can after the tornado. I stand ready to help. Will continue to pray for all Missouri storm victims. 21 hours ago

“…I have offered whatever help I can after the tornado. I stand ready to help…”

Does that include advocating for federal disaster relief? Or just a hot meal? Just asking.

Others are, too:

@Psyched55 Dr. Connie S.

@RepHartzler I hope your help includes votes that keep aide intact for those who are suffering rather then putting stipulations on such aide 20 hours ago

@aprillivings April Livings

@RepHartzler: Does that help include making sure that all aid is offset by spending cuts? Aid should not be held up by politics. 15 hours ago

Really, without the republican majority’s insistence on budgetary reductions in times of need we wouldn’t be able to protect those windfall tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires. And that wouldn’t be fair at all, would it?

And, the representative from Joplin?:

A Foe Of Big Government Seeks Aid For Joplin

by Frank Morris

September 23, 2011 12:01 AM

Billy Long is a Tea Party stalwart who ran for Congress as a man fed up with Washington.

Long won in a landslide and now represents Joplin, Mo., where he fired up a Tea Party crowd in April pretending to auction off the national debt.

Five weeks later, Long was back in Joplin, this time in the dark and rain, surveying the aftermath of an apocalyptic tornado. And this time, the federal government was his friend….

….What followed, Long says, has been a superb relief effort.

“The president came in, he was great. [Homeland Security Secretary] Janet Napolitano came in, she’s been great,” he says. “[House Minority] Leader Pelosi came up to me on the floor, hugged me and said, ‘Billy, anything the people of Joplin need they’ll have.’ ”

And that’s just what they’ve gotten: FEMA has spent close to $100 million on the cleanup, and an additional $19 million plus on rent and home repairs….

It must depend on where your backyard is.

Here’s a stormy, relevant and current reason to not vote for Mitt Romney. He wants to decentralize America’s disaster management and throw senior responsibilities to the states.

Essentially, he wants to gut FEMA-which of course worked so well for President Bush.

Bush neglected FEMA, put a horse-guy in charge and then Hurricane Katrina happened. In the words of another Republican from Texas-oops.

So now we have Mitt Romney attempting to backpedal from comments he made during one of those numerous Republican primary debates this year.

Here’s what he said:

“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.” ~ Gov. Mitt Romney

This is like a child talking. And it shows a completely sophomoric understanding of what real governing entails. Successful governing involves reacting to specific conditions each problem and/or opportunity presents-not using a one-size fits all, I got a hammer-and-the-world’s-full-of-nails approach. This inflexible ideological attitude toward things, like “always cut taxes,” or, “always deregulate”, is what brought to you other things, like the Great Recession.

Eugene Robinson in a Washington Post op-ed shared how Romney further explained his position on disaster management to CNN’s John King:

“King gave him a chance to back off: “Including disaster relief, though?”

Romney didn’t blink. “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.”

If Romney got his way, FEMA would be gone, or at least drowning in a bathtub somewhere. Social Security would be ravaged by the recession having been privatized during Bush. The American auto industry would have been totally parted out… but wait-a-sec, he’s the son of a car-guy, right?

Yeah, he might be, but as secret tax returns prove, Mitt R is not your father’s George R.

And that being the case, Mitt wanted to part-out Detroit. So he’s not the kind of car guy that builds cars, he’s more like the junkyard car-guy.

Kind of like outsourcing-he sees-no, he knows- the financial benefits to be accrued at the top when breaking apart something into small pieces, selling them off. So now he’s affixed this one-size-fits-all philosophy onto his political palette.

White canvass, one color; splash goes the economy. Trickle-down.

Everything gets parted-out to the states, or “even better,” to the private sector.

Problem is, national disasters are exactly that-national. So breaking FEMA down into individual state programs would invite a logistics catastrophe while our nation attempts to metabolize a multi-state superstorm like Sandy, or Katrina. It’s ridiculous thinking to privatize emergency management, or part-out FEMA. But this kind of moronic, elitist B.S. has come from his mouth and mind before, hasn’t it?

“Let Detroit Go Bankrupt”

Romney is desperately trying to distance himself from the New York Times op-ed he wrote in 2008, entitled, “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt.” His campaign has Google ads in place ready to capture any online reconnoiter about what he meant. His campaign would like you to know he didn’t actually say that in the body of the article and that the Times had purposely conjured an inartful rubric and slapped it on his sage business advice for the hemorrhaging U.S. auto industry.

But what he did say was totally wrong:

“IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye. It won’t go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed.”

Oops. But bottom line, even if the Times wrote the “Detroit Go Bankrupt” headline, Romney agreed to put his name on it. Just like the President agrees to put his name on the product of many of the administration’s collaborators-the buck stops there.

And here’s the point, regardless of the detail in the op-ed, allowing that kind of message to go out as representative of a former Presidential candidate’s (Romney’s 2008 run) position shows how completely tone-deaf, callous and irresponsible the man really is. It also foreshadows his political ineptitude and naiveté with several other campaign-road debacles. Like when he went to London and insulted their Olympics. Or the things he said about the irresponsible 47% (half of America) or how Republicans should be very worried that Latinos and African-Americans are gaining more political power with each progressing day. He said something like, “that would be bad for our nation and party.” Un-huh.

As Colin Powell intimated in his recent endorsement for President Obama, Romney is unstable, inconsistent and has zee-row political core or backbone. He’s a wind-sock. Don’t vote for a wind-sock. Vote for the skinny guy with the weird name.