How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin.
Ronald Reagan
"when socialism fails, blame capitalism and demand more socialism." - A friend
"You know the difference between libs and right-wingers? Libs STFU when evidence refutes their false beliefs." - Another friend
“Don't waste your time with explanations: people only hear what they want to hear.” - Paulo Coelho
This. There is no such thing as a general welfare clause. Read the Federalist if you believe otherwise. The cities and states should fix their own roads and infrastructure, tax the property owners accordingly, and let private insurance cover private property. I choose to live far from the ocean because I don't want my stuff destroyed every time there's a damn hurricane. Those folks choose to pay for the ocean view, the salt air, and all the headaches that goes with it. Why should I pay for it?
What took place the other night in the Senate, was nothing more than a repeat performance of the vote for OBAMACARE.
Remember when Nancy Pelosi told everybody..."We have to vote on it before we know what's in it."
Members of the Senate have now disclosed....they had THIRTEEN MINUTES to read more than 100 pages of the Bill.
But. Like before. They....THE ENTIRE CONGRESS.
SOLD EVERY AMERICAN DOWN THE RIVER, and THEY WILL DO IT AGAIN.
I love to make Liberals Cry, and Whine.
So, this is for them.
GOD BLESS AMERICA - IN GOD WE TRUST !
I think that a major reason Gov. Chris Christie was so angry is that the so called pork was removed from the law to get republicans to vote for it. Christie stated he was informed that the vote would happen on Tuesday but it did not happen and thus he was pissed. I believe he is my source that the alleged pork was removed.
I believe that disaster help, when approved by congress, should confine in words the law to just the issue of relief.
I would not go so far as to call all the spending that supposedly got removed as pork.
Some of those other projects are valid as to needs and are accepted as to purposes. But to highack the disaster law to include the others strikes me as pure laziness on the part of congress. That or they tried to pull the wool over our eyes again.
I am reminded that even today, 7 years later, Katrina damage still exists. Are those familes all forgotton?
DC might as well be in China for all I care. Seems to me that they promise help then wrap up the project in strings and broken promises.
The majority of Sandy aid, as was the case with Katrina, goes to businesses and public buildings. Homeowners benefit from low-cost federal loans, which are not exactly handouts.
Rebuilding offices and businesses directly affects the economy of New York and New Jersey, which in turn benefits the people who live there.
It's not exactly people lining up for a handout, though I am sure there are some who find a way to cheat the system.
Too add money to NASA, GITMO in a Hurricane package is pork. Indeed, considering Obama's signing statement last night included Gitmo as not worth the money it costs, is very interesting indeed. There is no doubt the add ons were pork.
Dan Coats offered an amendment to cut out the pork, it did not get approved.
"The government is a child that has found their parents credit card, and spends knowing that they never have to reconcile the bill with their own money"-Shannon Churchill
"The government is a child that has found their parents credit card, and spends knowing that they never have to reconcile the bill with their own money"-Shannon Churchill
Unfortunately, pork is the life blood of ALL politicians (both parties). There are various pork lists on line that list the worst offenders.
Worst thing is that the same politicians who complain about pork are not afraid to claim some for their districts or states. They believe it is their duty.
Speaking of, there was a story on the news this morning about various pork additions to the Fiscal Cliff bill, to make sure it passed. I believe there is money allotted for building NASCAR tracks and subsidizing asparagus farmers.
"The government is a child that has found their parents credit card, and spends knowing that they never have to reconcile the bill with their own money"-Shannon Churchill
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pork_barrel#History
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Pork barrel is the appropriation of government spending for localized projects secured solely or primarily to bring money to a representative's district. The usage originated in American English.[1] In election campaigns, the term is used in derogatory fashion to attack opponents. Scholars, however, use it as a technical term regarding legislative control of local appropriations.[2]<o></o>
History</SPAN><o></o>
The term pork barrel politics usually refers to spending which is intended to benefit constituents of a politician in return for their political support, either in the form of campaign contributions or votes. In the popular 1863 story "The Children of the Public", Edward Everett Hale used the term pork barrel as a homely metaphor for any form of public spending to the citizenry.[3] After the American Civil War, however, the term came to be used in a derogatory sense. The Oxford English Dictionary dates the modern sense of the term from 1873.[4] By the 1870s, references to "pork" were common in Congress, and the term was further popularized by a 1919 article by Chester Collins Maxey in the National Municipal Review, which reported on certain legislative acts known to members of Congress as "pork barrel bills". He claimed that the phrase originated in a pre-Civil War practice of giving slaves a barrel of salt pork as a reward and requiring them to compete among themselves to get their share of the handout.[5] More generally, a barrel of salt pork was a common larder item in 19th century households, and could be used as a measure of the family's financial well-being. For example, in his 1845 novel The Chainbearer, James Fenimore Cooper wrote, "I hold a family to be in a desperate way, when the mother can see the bottom of the pork barrel."[6]<o></o>
[edit] Definition<o></o>
Typically, "pork" involves funding for government programs whose economic or service benefits are concentrated in a particular area but whose costs are spread among all taxpayers. Public works projects, certain national defense spending projects, and agricultural subsidies are the most commonly cited examples.<o></o>
Citizens Against Government Waste[7] outlines seven criteria by which spending can be classified as "pork":<o></o>
- Requested by only one chamber of Congress<o></o>
- Not specifically authorized<o></o>
- Not competitively awarded<o></o>
- Not requested by the President<o></o>
- Greatly exceeds the President’s budget request or the previous year’s funding<o></o>
- Not the subject of Congressional hearings<o></o>
- Serves only a local or special interest.<o></o>
[edit] Examples<o></o>
One of the earliest examples of pork barrel politics in the United States was the Bonus Bill of 1817, which was introduced by Democrat John C. Calhoun to construct highways linking the Eastern and Southern United States to its Western frontier using the earnings bonus from the Second Bank of the United States. Calhoun argued for it using general welfare and post roads clauses of the United States Constitution. Although he approved of the economic development goal, President James Madison vetoed the bill as unconstitutional.<o></o>
1873 Defiance (Ohio) Democrat 13 Sept. 1/8: "Recollecting their many previous visits to the public pork-barrel,... this hue-and-cry over the salary grab... puzzles quite as much as it alarms them."
1896 Overland Monthly Sept. 370/2: "Another illustration represents Mr. Ford in the act of hooking out a chunk of River and Harbor Pork out of a Congressional Pork Barrel valued at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars."<o></o>
One of the most famous alleged pork-barrel projects was the Big Dig in Boston, Massachusetts. The Big Dig was a project to relocate an existing 3.5-mile (5.6 km) section of the interstate highway system underground. It ended up costing US$14.6 billion, or over US$4 billion per mile.[8]Tip O'Neill (D-Mass), after whom one of the Big Dig tunnels was named, pushed to have the Big Dig funded by the federal government while he was the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives. [9]<o></o>
During the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, the Gravina Island Bridge (also known as the "Bridge to Nowhere") in Alaska was cited as an example of pork barrel spending. The bridge, pushed for by Republican Senator Ted Stevens, was projected to cost $398 million and would connect the island's 50 residents and the Ketchikan International Airport to Revillagigedo Island and Ketchikan.[10]<o></o>
Pork-barrel projects, or earmarks, are added to the federal budget by members of the appropriation committees of United States Congress. This allows delivery of federal funds to the local district or state of the appropriation committee member, often accommodating major campaign contributors. To a certain extent, a member of Congress is judged by their ability to deliver funds to their constituents. The Chairman and the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations are in a position to deliver significant benefits to their states.<o></o>
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Aside from a check from FEMA for about $2000 V4R and I have received nothing from the government. The charity and government aid goes to the persons with their hands constantly out for gimmes. Most of the people I know, if they are getting any help, are getting low cost loans. Be aware, even with insurance, the losses were so overwhelming, the insurance couldn't cover it all. And the insurance companies are dragging their feet in paying out in many cases. I am not surprised at the additions to the law though. The bill had a lot of popular sympathy attached to it so lawmakers figured out ways to attach their pet ideas to it as usually happens.
I can't speak towards everyone, nor certainly anyone's insurance details. I never was licensed in a 'hurricane state,' so take this as you will. If your homeowner's included 'replacement value' which most do. If you carried riders for basement and hurricanes and any 'required in your state riders,' you should come out ok.
IF NOt, going to have to piece together the insurance you carried at the time and hope they fed helps you out. Personally, I'd be applying for the private relief, that seems more organized.
"The government is a child that has found their parents credit card, and spends knowing that they never have to reconcile the bill with their own money"-Shannon Churchill