Romney Has A Christie Problem, And A FEMA Problem..

[Wedgebuster]

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/j ... oblem.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Appearing on the networks this morning, Christie, for the third day in a row, heaped praise on Obama’s handling of the storm. “The President has been outstanding in this,” he told the “Today” show. On “Morning Joe,” he said, “It’s been very good working with the President. He and his Administration have been coördinating with us. It’s been wonderful.” Speaking on CNN,

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/j ... z2AoQkr8jg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Script of Romney wanting to dismantle FEMA is included in the article, here is the youtube of Mittens suggesting all FEMA activities be assigned back to the states, or even the private sector-

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTSHxR_4rc8[/youtube]

[dbackjon]

But he since Romney didn't refer specificially to Sandy, it doesn;t count.

[ASUG8]

Isn't posting this once enough?

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=32752&start=325" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Grizalltheway]

Isn't posting this once enough?

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=32752&start=325" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That thread is CS.com in a nutsack.

[Wedgebuster]

Isn't posting this once enough?

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=32752&start=325" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That thread is CS.com in a nutsack.

We don't anticipate pausing this thread so BDKJMU can be taken to the woodshed..



He's already there, taking a hell of a paddling from the Lounge gang.

[ASUG8]

I applaud Christie for giving credit where it's due. If he can get a lapband and not vaporlock shoveling snow between now and 2016 I think he'll have his oversized hat in the ring.

[GannonFan]

It's actually kinda of sad when you think about the state of our politics when one group of partisans get this excited over a member of the other party, putting partisanship aside, and complimenting someone from a different party. We should have more people like Christie in government - just speak your mind and not pay any attention to the "R" or the "D" that comes after the other person's name. The fact that a compliment becomes used as a significant political asset is disturbing because it implies that it shouldn't be done. Pity.

[Wedgebuster]

Going back to Christie's speech at the Republican National Convention, I think Romney had a Christie problem at that time as well..

[AZGrizFan]

Going back to Christie's speech at the Republican National Convention, I think Romney had a Christie problem at that time as well..

[BDKJMU]

Christie was right to praise Obama. Both Christie and Obama have appeared to conduct themselves well during this disaster.

The 1st thing people should turn to in any disaster is their family, friends, neighbors, church, etc.

The #1 govt responsibility in a town/locality facing a natural disaster is the local govt. The #1 person responsible for coordinating efforts is the local mayor or whoever the local leader is.

Only if that town/locality can't handle the situation should they seek help from the state govt. The #2 govt responsibility in a town facing a natural disaster is the state govt. The #1 person responsible for coordinating state efforts is the governor.

Only if that town/locality and state can't handle the situation should they seek help from the fed govt. The #3 govt responsibility in a town facing a natural disaster is the fed govt. The #1 person responsible for coordinating fed efforts is the head of FEMA. You can also throw in the POTUS.

Of course local and state govt's are overwhelmed with Sandy, so obviously the fed and FEMA have to take a major role. But in too many small natural disasters (I'm not talking Sandy here) its been a** backwards.

[BDKJMU]

Long 2011 article, but a good read, and certainly no conservative source. I just pasted part of it:

"'Disasters' strain FEMA's resources

.......Obama's action illustrates how the federal government is turning hundreds of relatively low-cost storms into federal disasters — draining billions of dollars in scarce FEMA aid and tying up millions more for years.

Those factors have helped to deplete the federal disaster-relief fund six times since 2003, stopping thousands of reconstruction projects for months until Congress allocated more money.

In addition, former FEMA leaders and government reports say, the soaring number of declared disasters has diverted FEMA from preparing for a Katrina-like catastrophe and has made states overly reliant on the federal government.

"The problem is, nobody ever turns them down," says Joe Allbaugh, FEMA chief from 2001 to 2003, referring to governors who seek disaster aid. "We can't say 'yes' all the time. And if we do, we're just setting ourselves up for no one to take responsibility except FEMA. There is no ability for individual states or local communities to enhance their own capabilities and personnel if you automatically always turn to FEMA."

Questions about FEMA spending

Since 1993, FEMA has "been called upon to support many routine natural disasters that historically would have been handled entirely by state and local governments," the inspector general of the Homeland Security Department said last year.

"As more disasters are declared," the report said, "more FEMA staff resources are diverted from planning and preparedness efforts." The inspector general found that FEMA, a part of Homeland Security, had made moderate progress since 2006 in preparing for a catastrophe.

Presidents make all disaster declarations, after governors request them. Most disaster aid helps rebuild infrastructure such as streets and schools. A smaller portion helps people whose homes were damaged.

Obama's Vermont declaration was the 50th declared disaster of 2011 with the year just half over. That's more disasters than were declared in all of 2005, the year of hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma. There have now been 89 declared disasters in 2011, a single-year record and nearly four times the average annual number in the 1980s.......

.......Although major events get the most attention, smaller storms account for most disaster declarations. Roughly half of the disasters declared since October 2007 have had projected damage of less than $10 million, including a January storm near Seattle that FEMA estimated caused $8.7 million in damage from floods, mudslides and landslides.........

......For governors seeking FEMA aid, the motivation "is not because they're trying to have a handout," says Mark Merritt, who was FEMA's deputy chief of staff during the Clinton administration and now president of disaster consultants Witt Associates, run by Clinton FEMA chief James Lee Witt. Rather, Merritt says, "it's the nature of politics in this country and the fact that there is so much media coverage of disasters these days that not doing so is looked at as being a failure."

Political pressure makes governors' requests hard to reject, says David Paulison, FEMA chief from 2005 to 2009 and now an emergency-management consultant. "You get a million phone calls from every congressional member in that area," he says.

At the same time, presidents and members of Congress have made disaster aid easier to get, particularly for smaller incidents. USA TODAY analyzed records of thousands of disasters declared as long ago as 1953 and found several factors contributing to increased spending on smaller disasters:

•Presidents Obama, Clinton and George W. Bush dramatically increased the use of "emergency declarations," which allow presidents to give states disaster aid after incidents that cause too little damage to qualify as disasters.

There were 173 emergency declarations from 1999 to 2009, compared with 114 in the preceding quarter-century. The 173 emergencies drained $1.6 billion from the federal disaster-relief fund, FEMA records show.
Paulison says emergency declarations are flawed because the standards are so loose. Under federal law, a president can declare an incident an emergency simply after finding that "effective response is beyond the capabilities" of a state and its local jurisdictions, without any guidelines concerning the cost of recovering from the incident.

"We need to tighten that up," Paulison says, suggesting clearer criteria for declaring an emergency.

New York state has had the most emergency declarations since 1999 — 13 — and most of the money offset costs of snowstorms.

•FEMA has reimbursed states $484 million in snow-removal costs since 1998, even though the agency once vowed to tightly restrict such payments, saying snow removal is the "responsibility of the state and local and governments" and that "there is no permanent damage to facilities resulting from snow."

State officials objected to FEMA's plan in 1996 to pay only for clearing one lane on snow-emergency routes and on roads leading to critical facilities such as hospitals. FEMA now pays 75% of snow-removal costs, and the payments usually come months after a snowstorm, when snow already has been removed or has melted.

"I don't think we have blizzards that are so catastrophic that they overwhelm state and local capabilities," says Matt Mayer, a former Homeland Security legal counsel who now criticizes department spending as a visiting fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation. "It's really about shifting the cost from one state to the other 49 states."
In late 2009, FEMA tightened its standards for reimbursing snow-removal costs.

•A few members of Congress, using the same "earmark" technique that secures special projects for their areas, have forced FEMA to divert $150million in additional disaster aid to their states since 2007 even though those states did not meet FEMA's criteria for getting the extra aid.
The lawmakers used earmarks to bypass federal regulations that say FEMA will pay 75% of disaster recovery unless the total costs exceed a threshold. The threshold this year is $125 for each resident of a state where a disaster occurred.......

......Witt, the former FEMA director who is now a business consultant, says disaster relief has become "a game."
"We have allowed FEMA to become a funding agent," he said. "It's a mechanism where members of Congress will put in language to fund a special project and then come around and beat up the (FEMA) director and say, 'Why haven't you funded my project?'".....

......Delays in settling relief cases

One consequence of the increasing number of disasters is that FEMA is taking longer to close the books on each disaster, which leaves hundreds of millions of dollars tied up and unavailable to be spent on new disasters.

When a disaster is declared, FEMA sets money aside after consulting with a state to pay estimated recovery costs. That money remains committed to an individual disaster until FEMA "closes" the disaster by certifying that all recovery work is finished and all spending is accounted for. When a disaster is closed, FEMA can reclaim unspent money and apply it to other disasters.

But disasters now take on average 10 years to close, FEMA records show, even though the agency says it typically takes four to five years for recovery work to be completed. Before 1990, disasters took an average of five years to close, records show.

The longer time period means that more money is likely to be sitting in old disaster accounts, waiting to be reclaimed for other disasters if FEMA could conclude the accounting.........
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/was ... 50886370/1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[BDKJMU]

Of course FEAM should be used for natural disasters like Katrina, Irene, Sandy, etc. But 89 times in less than 10 months of 2011, which is 4 times as much as it was used yearly back in the 80s, is asinine.

Clinton, Bush, and Obama have drastically escalated the use to FEMA for things that aren't real disasters and that the states are perfectly capable of handling themselves. And now every time you have a little "natural" disaster you have state governors and congressmen, both conk and donk, coming to the FEMA with their hand out, thinking the other guy is getting his, so I better get mine.

Romney was right- it needs to be scaled back more to the states. It makes no sense to have 10s of billions a yr in taxpayer $ go from the taxpayers to the fed govt then back to the states. That just wastes a huge chunk of $ on the middleman, DC, and pays for a bunch of worthless bureaucrats in DC. Cut out the middleman, DC, and the less of that taxpayer $ will get wasted on the middleman, leaving more for the states to deal with all the little natural disasters, and leaving the fed to only have to jump in on the big ones like Sandy. And you could say that about a lot of other areas of govt as well.

[Wedgebuster]

Oh of course Romney is right, just like you are.

[BlueHen86]

It's actually kinda of sad when you think about the state of our politics when one group of partisans get this excited over a member of the other party, putting partisanship aside, and complimenting someone from a different party. We should have more people like Christie in government - just speak your mind and not pay any attention to the "R" or the "D" that comes after the other person's name. The fact that a compliment becomes used as a significant political asset is disturbing because it implies that it shouldn't be done. Pity.

Agreed. I am glad that Christie gave Obama credit and I hope that Obama doesn't use it in a political ad. It may discourage future cross party compliments.

[BlueHen86]

Nice job by BDKJMU on this thread.

I gave him shit on the other thread, but I think he raised some good points on this one.

[Bronco]

-
Another fail added to the long list

By STEVE FRIESS | 10/29/12 4:48 PM EDT
When President Barack Obama urged Americans under siege from Hurricane Sandy to stay inside and keep watch on ready.gov for the latest, he left out something pretty important — where to turn if the electricity goes out.

Despite the heightened expectation of widespread power and cable television failures, everyone from the president to local newscasters seem to expect the public to rely entirely on the Internet and their TVs for vital news and instructions.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/10 ... z2ApBUtXz5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[BlueHen86]

-
Another fail added to the long list

By STEVE FRIESS | 10/29/12 4:48 PM EDT
When President Barack Obama urged Americans under siege from Hurricane Sandy to stay inside and keep watch on ready.gov for the latest, he left out something pretty important — where to turn if the electricity goes out.

Despite the heightened expectation of widespread power and cable television failures, everyone from the president to local newscasters seem to expect the public to rely entirely on the Internet and their TVs for vital news and instructions.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/10 ... z2ApBUtXz5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Are you really trying to say that it's the Presidents fault if people don't know what to do if the power goes out? I thought conks like yourself didn't like the idea of a nanny state?

[Ivytalk]

Meh. Christie is a straight shooter. No effect on the race.

[BlueHen86]

Meh. Christie is a straight shooter. No effect on the race.

His praise of Obama may influence voters in eastern PA. I heard his comments several times yesterday.
I don't think Obama should use Christies comments in an ad, but people who heard the comments may be swayed.

Romney is getting ready to runs ads in PA. Christies praise certainly won't hurt Obama.

[ASUG8]

Meh. Christie is a straight shooter. No effect on the race.

His praise of Obama may influence voters in eastern PA. I heard his comments several times yesterday.
I don't think Obama should use Christies comments in an ad, but people who heard the comments may be swayed.

Romney is getting ready to runs ads in PA. Christies praise certainly won't hurt Obama.

PA is already leaning pretty hard Democratic, right? I thought I heard 11 points in BO's favor.

[BlueHen86]

His praise of Obama may influence voters in eastern PA. I heard his comments several times yesterday.
I don't think Obama should use Christies comments in an ad, but people who heard the comments may be swayed.

Romney is getting ready to runs ads in PA. Christies praise certainly won't hurt Obama.

PA is already leaning pretty hard Democratic, right? I thought I heard 11 points in BO's favor.

Last I heard was 5 points - that was taken using the average of 5 polls taken a few days ago. Romney must think things have tightened up.

[DSUrocks07]

I don't think that PA or NJ is in play for Romney either way, I think that money should be well spent more in Ohio.

[BDKJMU]

MSNBC Ridicules Romney for Collecting Food and Supplies for Sandy Victims
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... z2Aoy9BldZ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And if Romney had done nothing he would have been ridiculed by MSNBC and others on the left, too. Damn if he does, damned if he doesn't.

[BlueHen86]

MSNBC Ridicules Romney for Collecting Food and Supplies for Sandy Victims
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-shepp ... z2Aoy9BldZ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

And if Romney had done nothing he would have been ridiculed by MSNBC and others on the left, too. Damn if he does, damned if he doesn't.

Romney is in a tough spot. He'd like to campaign, but he would look bad if he's out stumping for votes while the President is overseeing disaster relief. Romney probably did the best he could yesterday.

I wouldn't worry about MSNBC. I don't think a lot of people watch and the ones that do probably have their minds made up as to who they are voting for.

[Pwns]

After Obama's comments about Katrina came to light, I would hope that Obama busts his a** to make sure the federal government is on top of things.