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Friday, Jan. 25, 2013 | 2:01 a.m.
Another view?
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In response to Robert Blanner’s letter in Monday’s Sun, “When did we become so divided?” I want to agree. We have become more divided than ever since Barack Obama became our president.
Where I disagree, though, is his assessment of the opposition in the House to the bill for Hurricane Sandy relief. It wasn’t due to politics or being cold-hearted on their part. Quite the opposite. The bill was full of pork. Millions of dollars were put into the bill for things not related to Sandy whatsoever.
Those opposed wanted all the funds to be used for the victims of the hurricane and refused to sign it until the pork was deleted. We are in deep enough debt without adding even more pork.
Why is it that Blanner could not bring himself to acknowledge that it was another Democrat laden PORK BILL.
Melcom is right to call Blanner on his lie by ommision
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We are past broke
Pew poll show 73 % are concerned about our UNCONTROLLED SPENDING.
Reid must pass a budget this year
John Kerry at his hearing yesterday said we must bring our fiscal house in order
What propoganda! The House of Representatives had plenty of opportunity to amend the Sandy relief bill including completely offsetting the cost with spending reductions elsewhere. The latter was defeated and so the vote on final passage came down to will there be financial relief for victims of Sandy or not. The final vote was not a vote against pork, it was a vote against people.
Does GOP stand for Greenbacks Over People?
It's called "Filling the Tree." The Senate leader, in this case Reid, allows the majority party to fill a bill guaranteed for passage without debate with pork items. Reid has used it over 69 times since he's become Leader in 2007. The republicans who voted against risked their political careers by doing so. Gov Christie said they should have voted for it for the greater good. I opine Christie is getting soft and not just in his belly.
CarmineD
"Does GOP stand for Greenbacks Over People?" @ Jim Weber
No, GOP stands for "get rid of the pork."
CarmineD
Just so everyone is on the same page
The $50 billion Sandy PORK BILL PASSED BY THE HOUSE HAS NOT YET BEEN PASSED BY THE REID SENATE.
Harry Reid might put it up for a vote on Monday.
Why the wait in the Senate if it was sooooo important
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Banner is just part of Obama's annihilate the Conservatives with lies
"Why the wait in the Senate if it was sooooo important" @ Future
Excellent point. The Senate, under the lead of Reid, is debating a change to the filibuster rule. Reid in a power grab wants to change the super majority of 60 votes to 51. This will put the Senate's business entirely in the hands of the democrats in the Senate. The minority party will be snuffed out. There will be a compromise on this issue. Soooo Ried has decided this matter is more critical that the Sandy relief bill.
Any wonder that the NY Times, not exactly a bastion of conservatism, nicknamed Reid: Dirty Harry.
CarmineD
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We, who are sensitive about the out-of-control-spending in the pig sty known as Washington, DC, will never convince those who benefit personally from it. The parasitic class has swelled under the Osama Obama administration and that's intentional. Greedy & grubby, they want "IT" and they want "IT," now! Not content with taking from the productive class of today, they are more than happy to steal the future from generations to come. I hold them in the deepest contempt!
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"The House of Representatives had plenty of opportunity to amend the Sandy relief bill including completely offsetting the cost with spending reductions elsewhere"
Offsetting the cost with spending reductions elsewhere. LOL! The senate and Obumma never have, never will. Spend, Baby, Spend.
The republicans never worry about pork unless the democrats are using it.The Democrats rush to the aid of ANY state,RED OR BLUE, in a crisis.I only hope the Democrats learned a lesson from this prejudice against them.Watch the outrage,and the whining if the Dems wait 70 something days to react to the next republican states disaster.The red states are the biggest welfare recipients in the country,and like always, they complain about helping anybody,anywhere,unless it's in their states,AND THEY CAN CONTRACT IT OUT TO A BUDDY OF THEIRS.They have no shame,and no feelings for anyone who does not vote for them.Yes,GOP,stands for Greenbacks Over People,Guns Over People,ANYTHING OVER PEOPLE.
It's amazing how conservatives always talk about SPENDING when Democrats are in office.NEVER,has a republican been in office and not spent us into oblivion.They always send the deficit soaring out of control,and the Democrats always bring us back from complete meltdown.Obama has SPENT LESS then any president in recent,or past history.Yet,the facts mean nothing to the conservatives.Like global warming,and science,they seem to close their eyes to facts.Reagan left record deficits,Bush left record deficits,All republicans leave record deficits,and Democrats,always straighten out their failures.No wonder the people voted them out,they should stay away from the taxpayers money.
One of the common denominators of the teep and troll correspondents in these threads is that somehow, someone is getting "stuff", "it", "gifts", "entitlements", ad infinitum. Yet, nor surprisingly, they rarely can quantify any of this cornucopia of largesse. Further, they themselves, seem to be completely immune from such largesse.
An example bandied about on various teep part organs is reconstruction funds for re-planting trees damaged or destroyed by disaster. Up here in Eastern Washington we had a July windstorm [a microburst] which destroyed 16 houses, killed three, left hundreds homeless and without power and destroyed an estimated 6-10 million board feet of high value Ponderosa just on the Colville Reservation. Similar damage was reported across several counties. Those replanting funds were requested, in part, by our Republican Congresswoman, part of the leadership. Please explain to me how that is not a legitimate allocation or use of disaster funds.
Every year there are floods, blizzards, wildland fires, train derailments, landslides, insect infestations across the US, none big enough to trigger a full-throated Federal declaration but all challenging to individuals, communities and states. Bills such as Sandy relief almost always contain funding for smaller relief efforts.
What you see as pork, I see as a means to get my community back on it's feet and my neighbors back to work.
I beg to differ from the writer of this article,we did not become divided after Obama came into office,We were divided 8 years before he came into office,Bush saw to that,not Obama.The writers hatred for Obama is obvious,and misguided,and his common sense is on vacation.face facts,and quit being so angry about your party's failures.
Comment removed by moderator. Name Calling
Comment removed by moderator. Inappropriate
No discussion about pork is complete without talking about our porkaholics at the Pentagon, aka the Military Industrial Complex, a term coined by Eisenhower as he was leaving office.
http://www.npr.org/2011/01/17/132942244/...
"Eisenhower has a fan in fellow a Kansan, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates -- who kept a portrait of the former general in his office at the Pentagon, Bowman says.
Speaking at the Eisenhower Library last year, Gates talked about America's insatiable appetite for more and more weapons:
"Does the number of warships we have, and are building, really put America at risk, when the U.S. battle fleet is larger than the NEXT 13 NAVIES combined -- 11 of which are our partners and allies?
Is it a dire threat that by 2020, the United States will have only 20 TIMES MORE advanced stealth fighters than China?
These are the kinds of questions Eisenhower asked as commander-in-chief. They are the kinds of questions I believe he would ask today."
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See, rightwingers love their pork too. But because there's a Democrat in the White House, they're pretending to be on a strict vegan diet LOL.
Look how quickly Democrats dropped the Shady PORK BILL discussion when the realized that Harry Reid has not put it up for a vote
They are back to name calling and other nonsense
So why don't we ask oursleves why do they add any "Pork" to any bill. Seems to me that the Sandy Bill should be passed and "ALL" the money should be used for that relief only. Same goes for the ACA and "ANY" other bill put forward. I would not vote to pass a bill that allowed money to go anywhere but the place it is intended. Probably why I could never be a politician. Common sense doesn't rank as a requirment.
Any of us that agree with the passage of any bill that adds senseless spending that has nothing to do with the bills intent are playing a game that we'll never win.This goes for all sides of the aisle, the roof, the floor, the driveway.....anywhere!
Malcolm: spot on. This legislation is NOT designed for VICTIMS of Sandy. Twas designed for repair, maintenance, and remodeling government infra structures. Why should federal tax revenue be used in specific areas because local governments don't maintain nor insure...
1. Pork, i.e. riders and add-on bills are the preferred way Congress does business. Pork has not caused the hold-up on Sandy aid.
2. "Twas designed for repair, maintenance, and remodeling government infra structures" Those are the structures that Sandy destroyed and require rebuilding and remodeling.
3. "Why should federal tax revenue be used in specific areas because local governments don't maintain nor insure" the GOP in Louisiana didn't mind getting air for Katrina - so what's the problem with Sandy?
SunJon. again, Katrina destroyed levees which are the responsibility of the FEDERAL Corps of Engineers. Outdated infrastructure in New York that has been there for over a century without remodeling, repair, maintenance SHOULD NOT be paid for by federal revenues.
jspoon lets "Face Facts". The country is BROKE! Thats a fact. When are we going to control the spending. Please dispute the FACTS!
Just like the rest of America the moderators on this page refuse to address race as an issue. Probably because they are all Democrats. After all they work for the Sun and the Sun is so far left leaning that their nose is pressed against the wall.
I would like to offer another perspective on the Sandy aid bill. Recall that Pres Obama got $600 billion in new taxes over the next ten years. One year of that is $60B. Sandy aid cost almost $60B. Some Repubs were insisting that Dems offset the cost with cuts elsewhere. I don't know how Congress funded Katrina aid, but that was about 8 years ago even before the real estate meltdown. Now we need to consider debt with every vote, not just add to the deficit or eat up revenue before we even collect it as in this case.
News flash: Pres Clinton did not "fix" things, the Repubs under Gingrich shut down DC before Dems agreed to balanced budget law. Dems would not have agreed if it hadn't been for Repub resolve that time.
Folks are griping about taxes going up even with recent bill. Sorry but Social Security taxes are not the same. Congress (both sides) gave us a 2% "tax holiday" at the expense of SS. The two years of the 'holiday' are the first two years that SS ever ran a deficit. Congress had to pay back bonds and just added that cost to the deficit.
This is why we all need to hold our Congressional representatives to account for their sorry actions.