It’s a clown party, bro.
Republicans are mocking sequester cuts. Why? Because they’re jerks.
They’re feigning outrage that the sequester cuts have forced the White House to cancel tours, and mocking the president, all the while the sequester cuts are having real effects on real people. Everything ranging from programs to feed the hungry, to school lunches for low-income kids, to Head Start, to tornado relief efforts in Atlanta, Georgia, to border protection in Arizona to domestic violence services in Arkansas are on the chopping block.
People are losing their jobs, or are losing income because of furloughs. In Oklahoma, San Francisco, and St. Petersburg, Florida, airports are closing their air traffic control towers. Oh, and the Detroit airport is closing its control tower, forcing pilots to schedule their own departures and arrivals. Fantastic, right?
And, as Jed Lewison at Daily Kos pointed out today, the Army suspended its tuition assistance program.
The sequester is not funny — not to those affected by it. But Republicans would rather mock the fact that the sequester has hit the White House too, or introduce stupid bills prohibiting the Secret Service from protecting the president if he goes golfing (of all things) until the White House resumes tours, or feign outrage that “the people’s house” is closed than do their damn jobs.
Sign the petition ! RT @gop: Don’t fall for @barackobama’s spending gimmicks. Re-open the people’s house: bit.ly/Z6gzIH”
— Reince Priebus (@Reince) March 8, 2013
The people have more important things to worry about than cancelled White House tours, don’t you think?
Insulated from the reality of the sequester, the Beltway media is, of course, focusing on the GOP’s antics while local media are covering the very real ways in which the sequester cuts are sticking it to average Americans.
Here’s a list of local media coverage of sequester cuts, via Sam Stein at HuffPo. It’s a long’un, so you might want to grab a beer before reading (and do read the entire list so you can get a sense of exactly what it is Republicans have wrought on us):
· Recovery efforts following a tornado in Atlanta are being drained of federal help because of sequestration related cuts. [WAGA-TV]
· The Georgia Department of Labor is figuring out how to reduce unemployment benefits by nearly 11 percent starting on March 31. [WSB-TV]
· The Spokane County Meals On Wheels is looking at a45,000 budget cut. “I’m scared,” the program quoted one official with the group saying. “How do we keep serving all the people that need it?” [KREM-TV]
· Cleanup efforts following the Hanford nuclear leak in Washington state are complicated by $171 million in sequester-related budget cuts. “The largest part of those cuts would be in underground tank management,” reported KCPQ in Seattle. “New leaks were just discovered in six of those tanks.” [KCPQ-TV, KPTV-TV]
· Border protection agencies in Arizona and elsewhere plan to furlough employees for up to 14 days, with notices already sent out to 24,000 people nationwide. [KPNX-TV]
· Sequestration will likely increase homelessness across Arizona. “In Maricopa county there is a waiting list for rental assistance with 3,700 names on it,” reported KPNX. “That list is now closed and it could be a long time before anyone can get on it. [KPNX-TV]
· Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado is cutting623,000 from its budget because of sequestration, resulting in fewer employees, slower emergency response, and continued closure of the glacier basin campground. [KTVD-TV]
· Bell Helicopters in Fort Worth has started offering incentive programs to workers to encourage them to retire early so that they can save money to deal with sequestration. [KDAF-TV]
· Twenty-three Tooele County employees around Salt Lake City, Utah, were already laid off because of sequestration. “I thought it was a secure job, but apparently not,” said one laid-off employee. [KTSU-TV]
· The San Diego Housing Commission is staring at $7.5 million in cuts. [KSWB-TV]
· Little Rock, Ark., faces potential losses in funding for domestic violence prevention services. [KARK-TV]
· Mississippi food pantries are likely to take a hit with officials expecting “to see more people in line.” [WAPT-TV]
· Advocates in Kansas City, Mo., are going to Washington, D.C., to try and prevent expended cuts to scientific research into disease control and prevention. [KCTV-TV]
· Advocates in Nevada are pleading with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to try and protect food banks that the state’s children depend on. [KTVN-TV]
· KABB in San Antonio reported that $140 million of the $150 million in federal grants that the city received could be endangered by sequestration, “affecting programs like Head Start, transportation programs for seniors and WIC (nutritional programs for women, infants and children).” [KABB-TV]
· Housing officials in Austin, Texas are bracing for the forthcoming penny pinch. “Austin currently serves about 18,000 Austinites and has close to 10,000 residents on the waitlist for public housing and rental assistance,” the report went, “so, every dollar from the government counts.” [KTBC-TV]
· Detroit’s airport is closing its control tower, forcing “pilots to coordinate their own arrivals and departures.” [WXYZ-TV]
· Four local airport towers are closing in San Francisco. [KGO-TV]
· Albert Whitted Airport in St. Petersburg, Fla., is closing its tower. [WFTS-TV]
· Six air traffic control towers are closing in Oklahoma. [KJRH-TV]
· One official near a military base in St. Louis estimates that there could be a $28 million economic impact in the region. [KSDK-TV]
· Approximately 8,500 civilian defense employees at Fort Bragg are facing furloughs, and “officials and business owners say that could have a trickle down effect on the local economy” and that “the sequester will also impact schools at Fort Bragg and its five thousand students.” [WRAL-TV]
So while John Boehner and the assclowns at Fox News laugh at the White House locking its doors, remember that they are mocking the real effect that their political dipshittery has had on this country.
[via HuffPo]
scav
Of course they’re ignoring all those cuts: by definition, those are moocher govt. teat jobs, aren’t real jobs™, and don’t count.
SiubhanDuinne
I guess it would be wrong of me to hope that some of these Rethugs have to fly into Detroit, San Francisco, St. Petersburg or Oklahoma. I don’t actually wish airplane disasters on them, but I’d like ’em to be scared shitless for at least a few minutes.
Original Lee
They’re trying to avoid thinking about all of those phone calls from their constituents that aren’t getting answered because they had to furlough their staff.
Todd
Conservatism is all about making somebody who never has done anything to you suffer for the sake of your ideology.
You know, shared sacrifice and all that.
Onihanzo
I genuinely, wholeheartedly hate to say this but: So be it. There are too many Republicans given a free elective pass to do this shit. And yet, the country is always predictably shocked–SHOCKED!!–that real world consequences can be born out of their flag-waving obstructionism.
We are a nation that has ceded control to teenagers obstinately determined to play chicken with a train.
MikeJ
@SiubhanDuinne: It’s actually very safe to fly without a tower, but it means everybody builds a lot more margin in, so it is much, much slower. You can be safe faster with somebody who can see all the traffic at once coördinating.
BJ over
Forbes, March 3: Sequester was Obama’s idea
Sperling finally wilted under the pressure of tough questioning to admit that “yes, in fact, the sequestration was President Obama’s plan.”
On Tuesday February 19, press spokesman Jay Carney admitted “The sequester was something that was discussed… and as has been reported, it was an idea that the White House put forward.”
Just Some Fuckhead
@BJ over: In Obama’s defense, if he didn’t come up with a hideous plan, Republicans would have never supported it.
fuckwit
This is how we win back the People’s House (of Representatives) in 2014.
2014 house races are all local races, by definition. And the austeritan sadism that the Rethugs have inflicted on. you know, voters, will not go unnoticed by those voters.
Keep fucking that chicken.
Chyron HR
@BJ over:
Next you should try and convince America that the Democrats want to cut taxes for the rich.
Baud
@Onihanzo:
I agree. They want government to drown in a bathtub, let them deal with the consequences. Let’s show some resolve.
? Martin
Hurting people is a feature, not a bug.
Slitheytoves
@BJ over: @BJ over: Aren’t you in the wrong place? Aren’t they expecting you at Breitbart?
MikeJ
You should see how snippy they get when you try to leave with the people’s silverware.
Hill Dweller
@BJ over: The sequester was part of the wingnuts’ ransom for not destroying the full faith and credit of the United States, which would have been devastating for both our economy and the global economy.
Hill Dweller
@fuckwit: The sequester is rubbing salt in the wound for people who have already been enduring the wingnuts’ austerity at the state level for years.
Baud
If only there were some way the Republicans could come come together as a group, some sort of body even that had the power to end the sequester through a vote of some kind, that would have the effect of restoring funds to the government so the White House could stay open, then maybe they wouldn’t be forced to just talk about it on Twitter.
BJ over
@Hill Dweller:
The WH ADMITS that it was Obama’s idea, that he was the first one to propose it.
Hill Dweller
@BJ over: Does the sequester happen without Republicans demanding 2.2 trillion in cuts in exchange for not defaulting and destroying our economy…again?
Seanly
But, but, but according to the ad I am seeing, FEMA can buy the roomiest coffins I’ve ever seen. And in keeping with the black UN/FEMA helicopters, they appear to be made out of black plastic.
The sequester is stupid & petty BS. I hope it doesn’t last long. However, I’m very afraid that Obama & Reid will agree to terrible cuts in entitlements as well as maintaining the amount of sequester cuts & just making them allegedly smarter. In return, millionaires tax rates will go up some tiny trickle. Haven’t we trimmed enough from the federal budget? How does Charles Pierce put it? Fck the deficit, people got no jobs, people got no money.
I like Obama, but his now-constant talk about messing with entitlements is scaring me.
Chyron HR
@BJ over:
Not really getting any more plausible there, sport.
Yutsano
@BJ over: The White House didn’t pass it sweetums. The Congress did. Nice try deflecting the blame from where it belongs: the Republicans in Congress. Obstructionism has consequences. HOOCODANODE??
Baud
Shit. This thread is going to be trolls all the way down, isn’t it? Anne Laurie, where are you? We need your thread-stomping goodness!
Mnemosyne
@BJ over:
And, as your mom apparently neglected to say to you when you were five years old, if all of your friends jumped over a cliff, would you do it, too?
The Republicans had choices. They chose this over the other options available to them. At what point will you guys accept responsibility for your own actions?
srv
This might actually spur more private VFR aircraft traffic. They don’t care about towers.
But GA aircraft having to go IFR, going to be more complicated. But they’re all 1%’ers, so fuck them.
Hill Dweller
@Mnemosyne: We’re also supposed to ignore the Republicans celebrating when the sequester kicked in. It’s been widely reported they think it is a “win”.
jl
The GOPers will say that they are all silly harmless cuts, and crow about their victory in finally forcing those damn DemocRats to cut silly stuff like public health programs that only welfare cheats use, or wasteful silly programs like studying nematodes or fruit flies of some damn junk science egghead nonsense.
Until something they like is cut (like death machines), which will be a sinister conspiracy that is all Obama’s choice and fault. The two bit thug Issa has been running around CA, starting with their annual GOPer convention, yelling that the sequester’s military cuts are all Obama’s fault, and show how he wants to render the US defenseless. As if Congress had nothing to do with passing the sequester law.
BTW, the CA GOP convention was amazing, from what I heard over the news. Rove comes in and tells them to moderate a little and try to appeal to somebody besides the most fanatical loons in the party. That message lasted as long as old Rove was in the room. Everything else I heard was deranged far right lunatic hate and fear mongering, a la Issa.
Well, I should be glad. When I heard clips of Rove’s address, I was afraid for a second that the CA GOP would listen to him. But looks like I did not need to fear.
jl
@Yutsano:
” @BJ over: The White House didn’t pass it sweetums. The Congress did. Nice try deflecting the blame from where it belongs: the Republicans in Congress. Obstructionism has consequences. HOOCODANODE?? ”
Not to mention that the WH supported the sequester in order to head off a first time in 220+ year US government default, which was threatened by reactionary and vicious loons in the House GOP. But I guess that is irrelevant.
BJ over needs to get better material.
scav
@jl:
I think you just identified the tricky part . . . . . .
fuckwit
Gawd, looks like we got us a troll up in here.
Rethugs have been demanding spending cuts for, like, ever. But they’ve never actually manned up and identified which cuts they wanted. Probably because the people who voted for them would be horrified– and unemployed– by those cuts.
So Obama gave ’em an option of across-the-board spending cuts, called a sequester, absolving the Rethugs of the responsibility to do their jobs and get specific about which cuts they wanted. Fish or cut bait: if you want cuts that badly, here’s a work-free and responsibility-free way to get them! And, rather than actually DO their jobs, the Rethugs opted to let the sequester happen.
The sequester is not a solution. The sequester is Obama giving the Rethugs what they’ve asked for.
What Obama has been proposing all along as a solution to this problem, is what he’s still proposing: a mix of higher taxes on the rich and some more judicious spending cuts and efficiencies.
We on the left have been saying, fuck the spending cuts, just tax the goddamned rich! Obama, unfortunately, not being a dirty fucking hippie like the rest of us, wants to split the baby in half, and do both higher taxes on the rich AND spending cuts for everyone else. Fine.
Rethugs, being cowardly sadists, want only spending cuts that hurt their own voters, but without taking blame for doing it.
Everyone who actually lives in the real world– those whose jobs are getting axed right now as we speak– actually understands this already.
Here we are in sequester-land. You want spending cuts? You got spending cuts. Don’t like ’em? Then raise taxes. Or elect people who will.
lojasmo
@BJ over:
UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH makes for a great President Elect Romney, AMIRITE?
Yutsano
@jl: Yesbut…Obummer still came up with it! It was his idea! He’s totes to blame!!
Seriously, when did the President start actually writing the laws?
phil
@BJ over: Obama is not up for re-election next year. Voters will notice if their Republican congress critter is not bringing home the bacon and vote accordingly.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@BJ over: To bad the GOP wasn’t in charge of some Federal level legislative body to thwart Obama’s evil plan, you know that whole competing ambitions thing the Founding Fathers wanted. Till Obama sees reason I guess the Speaker of the House’s hands are tied.
IowaOldLady
The Republicans object to the suspension of WH tours and they think the public will be on their side? How can that be?
Mnemosyne
@IowaOldLady:
Because the Republicans are convinced that the public is just as upset as they are that Those People are living in the White House.
Turgidson
I don’t get it. Is “it was the WH’s idea” the new Benghazi or something?
OK, it was the WH’s idea. It was their idea to do the sequester rather than blow through the debt ceiling, which the teabagger morons in the House seemed willing to actually do. And they weren’t accepting anything else Obama was offering. Ruining the country’s credit rating and doing unpredictable but severe economic damage in order to deny the Obama Administration the authority to pay bills mostly incurred by the Bush Administration. Yeah, that was pretty cool.
Kind of like being forced to choose between hitting yourself in the head with a hammer or shooting yourself in the head with a gun. It was the WH’s “idea” to go with the hammer. Whoopdie shit.
lumpkin
Not to say that the sequester is all ok and everything, but you all know that the airports that are affected are not the main airports that serve the big airlines – right? They are local types of airports for general aviation, like small single engine planes. SFO and DTW will still have active control towers. It’s pretty absurd to think that a major international airport would have pilots scheduling their own takeoffs. So, even though you may fervently hope that a GOP congressperson will have to fly into hellish chaos at a major airport – well that isn’t gonna happen just yet.
jl
@Turgidson: Just keep reminding the innocently deluded, or the persuadable bigots getting tired of blaming Obama for everything and maybe looking for a way out of their glum mental dungeon, that…
the WH suggested the sequester in a last ditch attempt to stop the House GOP crazies from triggering a US government default.
So, in other words, the WH did not think up this idea out of the blue. The House GOP was threatening something far worse.
Maybe oldster teabaggers should be reminded that a US government default, threatened by the House GOP, might have quickly messed up their (very virtuous and perfectly well deserved) big gummint social security and Medicare checks. And bad old Nobama suggested the sequester in order to spare said big gummint checks from any unpleasantness. Maybe that will wake them up. If not, they are of the 17 percent who are beyond any hope.
jl
@Turgidson:
In last comment, I realize that is what you said. Just suggesting talking points that might persuade the persuadable (as opposed to the trolls).
jl
@lumpkin: Ok, there, you see. Those are not silly, and not obvious things that should have been done long ago, like supporting general aviation off of small aircraft license fees because shiftless small aircraft owners suck off big gummint teat. Nosirree.
That is a very very serious case of Obama playing politics with the sequester, a disaster of major proportions, and probably Obama should be impeached for it!
There you go. Not silly at all. Unless it is.
jl
@jl: Sorry. Not 17 percent, I meant 27 percent. Though I guess one can hope that one day, it will be.
lumpkin
@jl:
Not sure I understand your point. This was mine: The original post suggested that the control towers at major airports would be closed. This is not what is expected. These are small satellite airports that serve local flyers. I’m not saying that this is a good thing, just that it’s not as catastrophic as the idea that SFO or DTW is going to be dealing with thousands of commercial airline flights per day without a control tower.
jl
@lumpkin: I understood your point, and was snarking on how GOP will play both sides of sequester cuts to their political advantage, and make no sense whatever while they do so. My comment didn’t really address your point.
lumpkin
@jl:
ok. now i get it. what you were saying is pretty obscure unless the reader knows something about how the gov finances airflight infrastructure, which i don’t really, but finally figured out.
MomSense
@Hill Dweller: thank you for saying this. That the sequester only came up because the House Republicans were willing to destroy the economy and default on the debt has been conveniently forgotten.
FoxinSocks
I really appreciate this post. So many people I know are already suffering because of the sequester.
Meanwhile, the Republicans and the Beltway elite are having themselves a good chuckle at our expense, insisting that the sequester wasn’t such a big deal after all. Then they go ahead and point to the Dow and the latest job numbers, not understanding that the damage this is doing to the economy won’t show up for months still. Idiots.
jl
@FoxinSocks: The sequester is a gradually steepening slop, not a cliff. And this weak recovery may be strong enough by now so it does not cause a recession, but just keeps the job market recovery even weaker than it would be otherwise (which is actually pretty bad for the ‘lesser people’).
Even the mighty Kthug endorses that view. On other hand, if sequester extends for more than a quarter, and as the fiscal steepening slope steepens, I don’t think even folks with good prediction records like Krugman know for sure whether it can trigger a new recession or end this ‘recovery’ or half assed expansion, or horrible policy eff-up of macro policy, whatever you want to call it, sooner than otherwise.
I think short sequester no big deal. But a long one, I don’t think anyone really knows.
mclaren
I hope these Republican assholes keep it up. As the cuts mount and real people start getting laid off and losing their homes and going broke, it’s just going to get worse and worse and worse for the Republicans.
Original Lee
@efgoldman: Technically, Congresscritters will not be affected directly because their pay is unaffected. It is my understanding from friends who work on the Hill that at least some of their staff members are affected by the sequester, as are employees of the CBO, congressional committees, and the Library of Congress. The Congresscritters have discretion as to which of their staff members are furloughed or have to work without pay (with the promise of back pay), and which ones get to continue as if nothing has happened.