Widgetized Section
Go to Admin » Appearance » Widgets » and move Gabfire Widget: Social into that MastheadOverlay zone
GOP Faux Patriots Target Police and Fire Departments for Budget Cuts
Republicans in the House are on a rampage to eliminate at least 60 federal programs and drastically cut back hundreds of others as part of their promise to slash $100 billion from the federal budget. The Republican caucus met in a closed-door session of rank and file members to add across-the-board cuts to the targeted reductions spelled out earlier in the week.
The cuts are a blow to middle class and poor families as well as jeopardizing everything from food safety to law enforcement. The Republicans’ budget cuts are sure to set off a contentious battle between newly elected conservatives and the White House.
The budget cuts originally targeted education, the environment, food safety, and law enforcement that are crucial to American’s quality of life and future growth, but do not include defense spending or subsidies to the oil industry and corporations. The Republican cuts appear to be meant to kill jobs and poor people. Of special concern are Republicans’ intentions on cutting Social Security through cuts in benefits or privatization as a means of controlling spending. Social Security does not count in budgetary matters, but Republicans are continuing their lies that the program is an entitlement that is adding to the national debt. It is unbelievable that any working American thinks that Social Security is an entitlement when every wage earner pays in to the system before they can draw any benefits.
The list of budget cuts Republicans are proposing is a wish list for conservatives who will not consider government giveaways to oil companies who are making record profits, or the bloated defense budget. At the top of Republicans’ budget cuts are the Environmental Protection Agency and the total elimination of a high-speed rail program that will create jobs and reduce America’s dependence on oil. Republicans will not allow any program to continue that reduces oil consumption because the oil industry gods the Koch Brothers will not permit it any more than they will permit the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions or clean air and water. In fact, besides the EPA cuts, Republicans propose cutting Renewable Energy, Nuclear Energy, Clean Coal Technology and any other program that threatens to reduce oil consumption.
There are 70 spending cuts targeting everything from federal, state, and local law enforcement, food safety inspections, the IRS, Department of Treasury, Arts programs, and public radio, education and the Food and Drug Administration. Anyone making a perusal of the spending cuts list will quickly notice that every regulatory agency is on the chopping block as a nod to America’s advancement toward corporatism. As Republicans have promised, they are cutting programs for the poor like community health centers, maternal and child health grants, family planning, National Institute for Health, and HUD community development funding as well as job training programs, mental health services and poison control centers. Republicans have even targeted law enforcement because the oil industry does not benefit from money used to combat crime.
The House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers announced the spending cuts, and said that they will “significantly reduce the massive increases in discretionary spending enacted in the last several years by a Democrat majority.” Rogers continued that, “These cuts are real and will impact every District across the country – including my own. As I have often said, every dollar we cut has a constituency, an industry, an association, and individual citizens who will disagree with us. But we will respond to the millions of Americans who have called on this Congress to rein in spending to help our economy grow and our businesses create jobs.” Rogers is a filthy liar. His list does not include any cuts to defense, corporate tax breaks, or the oil industry. The budget cuts only affect poor and working class Americans and will certainly not create jobs. Cutting health services, law enforcement, and education will cut jobs and any American who believes otherwise is a fool.
Cutting police and fire department funding will not create jobs and Republicans are counting on gullible Fox News viewers to support those cuts. The IRS collects tax owed to the government and cutting the IRS budget will not create jobs any more than cutting funding to Planned Parenthood will create jobs.
Americans expect the government to guarantee safe food and drugs as well as clean air and safe air travel, but Republicans are cutting those programs claiming that unsafe food, drugs and air travel creates jobs. At least Republicans have been consistent in lying to the American people and treating them like the stupid voters they are. Any American who believes cutting law enforcement or education will create jobs deserves to be victimized by an uneducated criminal.
Americans want fiscal responsibility in government, but they also deserve honesty from their politicians. Republicans took control of the House by lying to the American people with promises to create jobs and help move the economy forward. Instead of creating jobs, their budget cuts guarantees job losses across all sectors at the same time diminishing the safety of our food, drugs, air and water, as well as deepening our dependence on oil.
Republicans’ proposed budget cuts ensure that the poverty level will grow and corporations will increase their stranglehold on the wealth in America. The Republican budget cuts guarantee that America will soon overtake Egypt with one of the highest poverty rates in the industrialized world. When Americans are desperate, they will react like the protesters in Egypt, except in America, demonstrators will not use sticks and rocks because every citizen has a firearm. They will remember which party sent them into abject poverty and eliminated their jobs so the oil industry can keep their billions in subsidies. Americans deserve better than Republican leadership and the job killing cuts they are proposing. Republicans better hope there will be law enforcement officials left to protect them from sick, poverty stricken citizens who have no jobs; they are going to need protection.
Related Posts :
In the now 300 plus days since Republicans have taken control of the House, GOP policies have zero jobs ...
When Republicans were campaigning for the midterm elections, their main promise was to create jobs. Aft ...
The devastating earthquake that rocked Japan on Friday was one of the most powerful in recorded history, ...
In most third world countries, citizens living in abject poverty is as normal as the sun rising in the E ...
After approximately two-and-a-half months, the Republican majority in the House has demonstrated their u ...
17 Responses to GOP Faux Patriots Target Police and Fire Departments for Budget Cuts
Public Service Advertisements
Anne
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 11:06 am
It’s ironic that so many police officers continue to vote Republican in spite of the fact that, for example, gun control laws work in their favor. The Party of No seems hell-bent on alienating every constituency of voters because they have not proposed anything that would make a serious dent in the deficit–only proposals that would hurt middle-class and poor Americans.
Mave55
Feb. 13th, 2011 at 9:53 pm
thewatchmenneedwatching.b...
Dan
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 11:07 am
While I agree with you on alot of the issues in this piece, I think you could have gotten your point across without being so mean spirited. Remember we’re the good guys!
Anne
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 11:23 am
I agree that the majority of police officers are the good guys, which is why it makes no sense for the Party of No to treat them so shabbily. As someone who is actually employed with a police department, I wonder how this is going to work out.
cleo17
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 1:02 pm
Here’s the game plan guys. GOP plans to destroy these services so that mayhem can break loose with none of these services. People willl get mad angry and they know it. And they will use to fire them up to come after our President. This whole plan is to deprive us all of as much as possible to make us incredibly angry at Obama. But we see whose doing this. The masses will come after the GOP and we will demand like the peopel of EGYPT for this self serving greedy mean spirited hateful bunch of so called american representatives and ask them to kindly LEAVE OUR AMERICA AND ITS PEOPLE ALONE! GEt out!
Shiva (Moderator)
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 1:20 pm
if the Democrats do not use this against the Republicans in 2012, and I mean on a seriously heavy bases, then they deserve to lose.
The problem is we do not deserve to lose. And every single one of these bills that was mentioned is a loss for the American citizen.
I’m serious, if the Democrats do not speak up heavily about this that I think it’s a pretty good indication that they are in with whatever the Republicans are trying to do. This is no different to me than the Christians not speaking up against Brian Fisher. In this case, the axiom you are either with them or against them is frighteningly truthful
Reynardine
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
Thirty years back, my mother (peace be with her) believed the Reagan Republicans were trying to institute a peon society. At the time, I thought this was too insanely, unprofitably malicious even for them and that the shadow of her last illness was darkening her outlook. Were she here, she’d be saying, “See! I told you so!” If “the little people” can receive no protection they cannot pay for, they are completely subjected to the whims of the powerful. What happened to the promise extracted from John Lackland in the Magna Charta and incorporated in many state constitutions, that justice shall be neither sold nor denied? Now the protection of the State is to be sold to those who can pay and denied to the rest of us.
Bob
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 3:39 pm
This article is all over the board and makes so many bombastic statements that the author’s points become moot. First of all, I support across the board budget measures to include spending cuts as well as cutting tax loopholes for the rich and corporations.
At the same time, how are we going to have a balanced budget if we don’t cut spending?
This author goes for two of the old favorites: law enforcement and education. These are clearly bloated areas of public expenditure where drastic cuts are needed. I live in a city of well over 1 million people. Every year local newspapers publish lists of just “city” employees who make well over $100,000 per year – before benefits! There are literally hundreds of “public servants” on this list – police, fire, engineeers, department heads, etc. In this era of financial austerity, why should these people make so much more than the average citizen, the citizen who pays their wages?
As for education, similar comments apply. In fact, one of my family members is a principal of an elementary school in a small town. Her salary, benefits, and time off far eclispe the wages of the average worker in her town. Why should she be paid two or three times what the local community makes? It really gets tiring, hearing the cries of “protect the public sector workers” when so many of these people make much more than their private sector equivalents.
Shiva (Moderator)
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 4:05 pm
Are you one of the people who supports CEO wages being 400% higher than the average salary in a corporation?
Cutitout
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 6:46 pm
sorry the 400% wage by a CEO is NOT THE GOV’s business.
I would say that this issue would be better solved by the customers and/or stockholders.
Keep the dam gov out of this crap
majii
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 5:08 pm
Just as pay cuts for an individual worker doesn’t help him/her be better able to meet his/her financial obligations, cuts in these vital programs in a fragile economy will mean that many who work in government jobs will lose all of their income. This will, in turn, affect the employment of others. The result would most likely be an increase in the unemployment rate and an increase in the number of Americans living in poverty. Combine these with the republicans’ unwillingness to do anything for the average American, and you have a recipe for economic and social disaster. The republicans now hold the majority in the H. or Reps, so they will not be able to blame the democrats or President Obama for the negative fallout that will result from their actions.
Kevin
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 6:16 pm
I agree that there is a lot of bloat in the pay scale for *some* public sector workers, but many state’s are stretched to the limit–if not totally under water–and have made cuts in every conceivable capacity. I know this because I worked for a small city office and they were scraping for every single penny just to keep the lights on a patrol cars in the streets.
The bare fact is that the public sector provides services that improve quality of life for Americans.
Thousands of American soldiers fighting farmers in Afghanistan doesn’t do that. A nuclear arsenal capable of cooking the world four times over doesn’t do that. 480 active US military bases around the globe doesn’t do that. Subsidies for oil company execs making record profits doesn’t do that.
Boehner et. als. proposals will damage the future of America far worse than debt ever could. American’s can learn to live more austerely, but cutting back on education, police and other vital public services will cripple the next generation in ways that only a short-sighted, profit driven politician could.
Are we going to import the next generation of doctors from China, like we do everything else? Its already happening. Do you think we should we just encourage it?
Cutitout
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 6:57 pm
so i gather you support larger budgets, higher taxes, and more gov employees ?
No – no more debt – no more tax increases. Live within your means just like the rest of us have to do. When the credit card is maxed out you don’t keep asking for a credit line increase.
K
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 5:29 pm
That high speed rail is a great idea, I know its foolish to hope for it. But I would LOVE for there to be a way to travel across the country without getting in a fucking plane and getting groped.
DOT cuts worry me the most. Anyone want to place bets before the first public transportation strike happens? Its going to be awful.
And of course as you cut more jobs, poverty increases, which almost always shows an increase in crime.. and then less police.. less fire, that means more damaging fires, more money paid out from insurance companies..
How fast will we sink.
Cutitout
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 6:45 pm
hi speed rail might benefit the big cities – which are coincidentally probably airline hubs as well – so lets do the math on this –
50+ billion to allow folks to speed from one city to another – airline travel between those cities suffers – and next it will be the airline industry asking for a gov bailout.
1/2 to 3/4 of this country will be too far away from the terminals to use it – and it will lose money too.
Now we will have AmtrakII sucking another yearly operating loss.
Heck no – thats the first thing i’d cut too… amongst many others.
Reynardine
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 8:40 pm
Now, you and the army of trolls who descended on us: I know what I’d cut, so keep it in your pants.
Cutitout
Feb. 11th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
sorry my tax dollars are not yours to spend willy nilly as you please