Tancredo to Gulf Coast - Drop Dead

(The J Train here again.)

GOP presidential longshot Tom Tancredo (R.-My Ass) plumbed previously unexplored levels of chutzpah today as he told those freeloading Katrina victims that it's time to get off the Federal teat.

GOP presidential hopeful Rep. Tom Tancredo (Colo.) said Friday it is “time the taxpayer gravy train left the New Orleans station” and urged an end to the federal aid to the region that was devastated by Hurricane Katrina two years ago.

“The amount of money that has been wasted on these so-called ‘recovery’ efforts has been mind-boggling,” said Tancredo, who is running a long-shot presidential campaign. “Enough is enough.”

Citing administration figures, the lawmaker said that $114 billion has been spent on the effort to rebuild a large stretch of the Gulf Coast after the storm hit New Orleans in August 2005 and claimed more than 1,600 lives.

“At some point, state and local officials and individuals have got to step up to the plate and take some initiative,” said Tancredo. “The mentality that people can wait around indefinitely for the federal taxpayer to solve all their worldly problems has got to come to an end.”

For those scoring at home, $114 billion is about half of the supplemental bill for Iraq that Bush is getting ready to request (~$200 billion). Which is on top of the $500 billion we've already spent in Iraq.

The federal government has covered the Gulf Coast in a sticky brown substance, all right, but it ain't gravy.

Comments

[cfrost]

Yeah, Tom Tancredo, Larry Craig, David Vitter, Trent Lott, Joe Leiberman . . ., yuck. Don’t eat in the congressional cafeteria, and for God’s sake stay out of the congressional restrooms.

[togolosh]

Sooner or later aid to the Gulf Coast has to end, but I'd suggest that perhaps that ought to be after there are robust levees in place, reliable pumps (one's that actually work, f'rex), and effective hurricane response plans ready to cope with the next major event. To my naive mind that ought not take too many billions of dollars, provided it's not diverted to pork barrel projects and well connected contractors. What happened to NO is going to happen to other cities around the world (including in the USA) as Global Warming raises sea level and hurricane intensity. Using NO as a testbed for technologies to deal with these problems is not just good public policy, it's good economics - making sure that American companies are the go-to people for dealing with hurricane damage prevention and mitigation is damn good for the economy. Recall that it was American companies that had the expertise to deal with the Kuwait oil fires after GW I - there is absolutely no reason the hurricane problems shouldn't immediately call for the services of similar companies based in the USA. The world is changing and it makes basic sense to try to ensure that America is prepared not just to deal with the consequences for ourselves but also for others, and if that means a bunch of American workers get jobs out of it, so much the better.

[The Activist]

I agree with Tancredo.

[cfrost]

"I agree with Tancredo."

Sure. The ethnic cleansing of a suppurating boil of swarthy Democratic voters in an otherwise healthy Republican state has been accomplished. There's nothing left to do.

[A. Martin]

I agree with Tancredo.

Tancredo appeals to a very special group of mindless mouth-breathers by setting up his false dichotomy between citizens of the Gulf Coast and "federal taxpayers."

If the administration had helped Katrina evacuees right when the disaster struck, and if they had instituted a sensible long-term plan for rebuilding that area, there wouldn't still be people living in FEMA trailers two years later.

Taxpayers aren't forking out large sums of money because Katrina survivors lack initiative; they're forking out that money because their government is utterly incompetent.

[Cass]

I don't think "incompetence" is the right word for what happened in New Orleans; they never showed any investment in doing a good job to begin with. In any case, Tancredo's (sickeningly predictable) words need to be read alongside Matt Taibbi's report in RS on the breathtaking levels of waste, fraud and corruption that gone down in broad daylight the last four years in Iraq. This is the way reactionary government has worked in the South for decades: you piss on the commoners (who take it, more or less, with a frozen smile) then direct their rage to people further down the societal totem pole. Reactionary submisssiveness doesn't allow for questioning of one's noble leaders. Karl Rove knew very well, I think, that they'd never be called to account for any amount of money they stole in Iraq; nor would a large part of their base care if a largely poor, black city drowned in their living rooms.

[Cass]

And Tancredo, need I remind you, was the only one of the Republican candidates to even show up for the NAACP debate!

[Brett]

Great. Louisiana and Mississippi should abandon its contracts as well, and suspend all shipping of gas & petroleum. Tancredo can suck the fumes.

Very, very has been rebuilt here, and what has been rebuilt is suspect, as many of the contracts were doled out flunkies... not old school local crooks, but the usual suspects, Halliburton and other Republican gravy machines.

No, $114 billion dollars has not been spent here. The funds never arrived.

No one has been sitting around in New Orleans waiting for help. Citizens have been trying to rebuild the entire time, even though in places no infrastructure exists. In certain places, they are driven out at gunpoint by mercenaries, because developers want imminent domain to be declared.

I drove over to Biloxi last week, where Katrina actually struck worst. No one is rebuilding on the shores. The coast is denuded two years later. There are almost no recognizable landmarks. The people that lived there were scattered to the winds.

Tancredo is the lowest sort of scum, and he'd best not show his face in this area.

[Guest]

I don't believe the number. $114 billion dollars, where, to whom, when? Given how ridiculous Tancredo's position is, I think it's likely that number is straight-up bullshit.

[JibJab]

togolosh's response is a typical mouth-breather response. they give no reason why they agree, just tow the party-line like a blind ape.

[Graham]

Let me get this straight.

114 billion (for the sake of argument) to help people is bad. 500 billion (and counting) to blow shit up is good.

He's a good little Republican, ain't he?

[Graham]

Let me get this straight.

114 billion (for the sake of argument) to help people is bad. 500 billion (and counting) to blow shit up is good.

He's a good little Republican, ain't he?

[cfrost]

Now let’s not all gang up on Rep. Tancredo. Remember, no one is working harder than he to protect us from the Mexi-menace lurking at our southern border.

First, let’s get one thing straight, if any Katrina relief moneys were misspent or stolen it’s the fault of Louisiana Democrats.

Second, he has a plan to fund Katrina disaster relief: we sell off 15 percent of federal lands. After all, as Tom said:

“This has been a horrific natural disaster that has torn apart a large portion of our country and took many lives. But in this disaster, we have a God-given opportunity to finally, permanently reduce the size of government.”

Finally, let's not forget that of all the craven dogs in Congress, it’s only Tancredo that has had the guts to stand up and fight for The dog, that is, blond-maned, celebrity bounty-hunter extraordinaire, Duane "Dog" Chapman.

[Lesley]

Funny Tancredo, since the money Bush "invested" actually went into the pockets of greedy capitalists...a carbon copy of the fiscal behaviour in Iraq. It would be nice to see some genuine aid for a change.

[togolosh]

jibjab - exactly what do you disagree with in what I wrote? I'm a liberal, btw, as you might infer from the fact that I explicitly endorsed having plans in place to prevent future problems of this sort and to mitigate the effects. Perhaps you confused my response with that of TheActivist?

[oyster]

The $114 billion number is false, and is exclusively used by the administration and others when the subject is New Orleans. That bullsh-t number includes 22 billion in flood insurance payments to people who paid flood insurance premiums. Are federally guaranteed insurance payments a handout? Hell no!

That number also includes at least $75 billion in immediate post storm relief-- clearing debris caused by wind and poorly designed federal levees that catastrophically failed, as well as paying for formaldehyde-ridden Fema trailers to house folks that lost their home.

The number covers assistance to the entire Gulf Coast, from Tejas to Florida, and includes assistance for Hurricanes Rita and Wilma.

The number also includes rebuilding the levees to grossly insufficient 100 year storm levels, instead of a much higher standard that would protect against strong Cat 3 or 4 or 5 storms. There's very little money going to wetlands restoration, which protect against storm surge.

Tancredo has suggested building border walls on America's southern AND NORTHERN borders, but apparently thinks protecting New Orleans is too expensive. So he disparages survivors who lost everything due to federal levees that burst while Katrina was still 70 minutes away from Buras LA, which is 70 miles SOUTH of N.O..

[Ben Guerrero]

Tancredo was so embarrassed about his own ethnicity he didn't want his mother's spaghetti dinners to make money for his campaign. Imangine that. He thinks he is a WASP but he's a Wop. You know, the sound that shit makes when it hits a wall.

He is deathly afraid of Aztlan. But, as I emailed him before, Aztlan is almost here.

Mussolini was a Fascist and so is Tancredo.

[Cass]

It amazes me that some people are still so self-conscious about belonging to different categories of European- it seems so McKinley Adminstration. Undoubtedly, though, there are those in Tancredo's base who suspect some wider conspiracy of Papists, Latins and swarthy Mediterraneans to undermine the foundation of white Protestant civilization.

[Ted Powell]

JibJab: "...just tow the party-line like a blind ape"

When people line up on a parade ground with their toes on chalk lines (to get evenly spaced straight rows from an untrained group), they are not picking up the end of the line and towing it, they are "toeing" it.

Same thing when the term is used figuratively; they are aligning themselves with a line laid down for them by the party, figuratively putting their toes on the line. No towing involved.

[bjk]

Why do we want people living under sea level? So we can whine and cry and blame someone else when they choke on seaweed again? No thanks!

[togolosh]

bjk - is it any dumber to live below sea level than to live in a semi-desert dependent on water piped in from hundreds of miles away? That covers much of Arizona and a big chunk of SoCal, btw.

The fact is that sea levels are likely to rise and we can either develop defenses that are effective and reliable or we can uproot entire cities and move them to higher ground. The Dutch manage to live quite comfortably on ground below sea level - why can't we?

[bjk]

And if those desert cities were knocked out by a tornado, should they be rebuilt? What sense does that make? I don't get the liberal obsession with NO. Actually I do. It's just another thing to blame on George Bush when, in this case, he's doing the right thing, which is as little as possible.

[troutsky]

cfrost sees opportunity in disaster, profit to be made , by God, a little silver lining. Should work for Bechtel.

[farang]

togolosh,

Please go down to New Orleans and spew your garbage. Of course Bush is doing as little as possible: That's all he knows how to do.

Little mind, little man, little effort made.

On the other hand, you should feel thankful farang isn't close enough to hear you talking out your anus, or I'd tear you a new one.

Why?

Because I don't recall hearing this asinine bullshit about "too much relief given" when Andrews ripped Republican Florida homes apart.

STFU. Ya hear?

[iain]

Farang,

Where does togolosh say anything about 'too much relief given'? Can you see a comment from him/her that I can't? As far as I can tell, everything s/he's written in this thread has supported continued relief.