Reflections of Teacher Ken
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NYTimes: A Big Storm Requires Big Government
Their editorial makes the argument for what big government does at the same time it takes Mitt Romney and Congressional Republicans apart.
IT begins like this:
IT begins like this:
ost Americans have never heard of the National Response Coordination Center, but they’re lucky it exists on days of lethal winds and flood tides. The center is the war room of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, where officials gather to decide where rescuers should go, where drinking water should be shipped, and how to assist hospitals that have to evacuate.then reminds readers of Romney's previous statements (relevant, given that he is now trying to do with his statements on FEMA what he has already done with his statements on the auto industry): Mr. Romney not only believes that states acting independently can handle the response to a vast East Coast storm better than Washington, but that profit-making companies can do an even better job. He said it was “immoral” for the federal government to do all these things if it means increasing the debt.The editorial traces the history of FEMA from its founding under Jimmy Carter to its being demoted and diminished in the last administration - anyone here remember Michael "you're doing a heck of a job" Brown? He is one of what the editorial calls the political hacks Bush place in charge of the agency. That paragraph ends
The disaster of Hurricane Katrina was just waiting to happen.The editorialists remind people that Romney is not alone in his ideological approach to FEMA, that he has many allies in that approach among the Republicans in Congress who
don’t like the idea of free aid for poor people, or they think people should pay for their bad decisions, which this week includes living on the East Coast.There is more. There is the fact the financially strapped states could not respond to a catastrophe of this size on their own. There is Romney's "nervous campaign" saying now that he does not want to abolish FEMA, even though there is a reiteration of his belief that states should be in charge of responding to such disasters.The conclusion of the editorial is simple and to the point:
Those in Hurricane Sandy’s path are fortunate that, for now, that ideology has not replaced sound policy.
