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You are here: Home / Politics / Republican Stupidity / Apparently, to the Surprise of Republicans, the Government Actually Does Useful Things

Apparently, to the Surprise of Republicans, the Government Actually Does Useful Things

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Clowns:

We’ve noted previously that outside Washington D.C. — where politicians and reporters obsess endlessly over inconsequential but high-valence things like White House tours and Easter egg hunts — sequestration is beginning to cause real harm, and political pain.

Now, nearly a month after President Obama was forced to issue the sequestration order, the central source of GOP’s real sequestration anxiety is becoming clear.

“I am disappointed to learn of the FAA’s decision to implement the budget sequestration by closing the air traffic control tower in Columbia,” wrote Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO). “This decision is disappointing not only because it presents a safety concern, but it is unwise from a budget perspective as Columbia’s tower is part of the Contract Tower Program that is cost-effective for taxpayers. There is plenty of waste that can be trimmed by administrators implementing the budget sequester and there is absolutely no need to put Columbia workers on unemployment because of the Obama Administration’s poor choices on where to cut.”

You mean the government does things other than buy cell phones and big screen televisions for welfare queens?

Reader Interactions

138Comments

  1. 1.

    PsiFighter37

    Don’t forget about the T-bone steaks for the strapping young bucks!

    And didn’t some assclown senator (think it was Isakson from GA) claim that his constituents were happy about the sequester?

  3. 3.

    PsiFighter37

    @taylormattd: John always steps on Anne’s posts, so that’s nothing new. However, I think there needs to be a line drawn between ‘firebagging’ and what may constitute legitimate criticism or points raised. It’s not firebagging by any stretch.

  4. 4.

    taylormattd

    @PsiFighter37: She’s fucking ridiculous and should be shit canned. She’s a liar, and pathetic. Why the fuck would anyone who wasn’t either deeply stupid, or suffering from ODS write this when discussing Guantanamo?:

    It would be much worse if Mitt Romney were in the Oval Office. But that’s one thing for which history won’t call Romney to account.

    Given Obama is pretty much *literally* the only politician in the country who tried to shut it down.

    Edit: she can also fuck off for never publicly apologize to ABL for her drunken, insane, front page trashing.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    Really, any Republican who complains about the sequester needs to be told in no uncertain terms, “support Obama’s plan to end it or STFU”.

  7. 7.

    J.

    The FAA closed the control tower by here in Danbury, CT, but planes are still allowed to land and takeoff there. They just need to be extra careful. Yeah, just be careful. Who needs those overpaid government controllers anyway? I am now waiting for the accident reports to become a regular column in the papers here.

  8. 8.

    Hill Dweller

    This can’t be right. Chris Cillizza and Glen Kessler told me Obama was crying wolf.

  10. 10.

    TenguPhule

    there is absolutely no need to put Columbia workers on unemployment because of the Obama Administration’s poor choices on where to cut.”

    Fuck the fucking liars.

    The GOP owns these cuts and where they went.

  11. 11.

    Gravenstone

    Someone apparently slept through the briefings about how the sequester was supposed to be universally unpopular because it was designed to spread the pain around. The intent of course to goad recalcitrant asses like these into actually crafting a budget to avoid the pain of the sequester. Reap as ye sow, or something like that…

  12. 12.

    MikeJ

    @J.: You really don’t need tower controllers to safely operate an airport, but it slows things down a lot to not have them. There are literally thousands of uncontrolled airports in the US, and collisions are still very, very, very, very, very rare.

  13. 13.

    Schlemizel

    @John Cole:

    aw shit, maybe you should take a poll to determine the ideal time between posts. Then you can assign slots: ABL, you get 6:15, AL, you must post at 6:51, Betty, 7:26:30 etc

    And you better assign topics too or we’ll start whining about duplicate topics or missing my particular pet beef.

    And after you have done all that and drained every last ounce of enjoyment out of the drudgery of posting we’ll all be pissed because we have to make up new things to be pissed off about.

  17. 17.

    Baud

    Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) should take solace in the fact that she hasn’t ended loopholes for hedge fund managers. In fact, she should be sure to mention that whenever she talks to her constituents.

  18. 18.

    taylormattd

    @Baud: Well, I suppose she may not ask qweshtuns about Rezko like Larry C. Johnson, she may not be “concerned” about his birthplace, and she may not form partnerships with Grover Nordquist.

    But anyone who posts this trash, and never acknowledges its insanity, let alone publicly apologizes: https://balloon-juice.com/2011/09/05/you-have-not-converted-a-man-because-you-have-silenced-him/

    Or who repeatedly cites to the psychos at FDL, and who passive aggressively blames Obama for *something he tried to shut down* is Obama-deranged.

  20. 20.

    Walker

    There is debate over whether they are more cost effective, but it is true that the FAA chose to close primarily contract towers. Even though Ithaca gets more air traffic than Binghamton, Ithaca (a contract tower) is getting closed while Binghamton (a standard FAA tower) is not.

  22. 22.

    Walker

    @MikeJ:

    But a lot of those towers do not have fast commercial traffic coming into them. If everything is the speed of a Cesna, it is cool. If you have got both CRJs and Cesnas coming in, it really helps to have a sequencer.

  24. 24.

    mai naem

    I don’t understand. Can’t Vickeee get her Chamber of Commerce buddies to build a tower? Freeee market baybeee! Freeee market baybeee! Y’all said Obama didn’t build it.

  29. 29.

    Baud

    @taylormattd:

    I guess firebaggery is in the eye of the beholder. For me, I need to see a sustained cynicism toward the Democratic Party with the implicit or express suggestion that liberals shouldn’t vote for or otherwise support Democrats as a whole. An occasional firebaggeresque comment or two isn’t enough.

  31. 31.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    @Ben Franklin:

    I don’t fly so fuck all y’all…

    I’d heard that you like to fly kites in thunderstorms, or was that just an urban myth?

  33. 33.

    Art Hughes

    @MikeJ:

    I can say that is true as far as it goes but only very rarely do you have commercial passenger planes landing at airports without towers and even then only in very limited numbers

  34. 34.

    Baud

    @raven:

    There was an article in the WSJ today about how the train business is booming, so you may have something there.

  37. 37.

    mai naem

    Here’s another one for the Draft Tbogg movement but I’m not sure Tbogg is going to want to continue. Sounded like he wants to go the Twitter route and Jane had to talk him into continuing a month ago.

  39. 39.

    A Ghost To Most

    He wouldn’t have to carry a blog here, just post when the genius comes.

    Speaking of geniuses, does El Cid blog anywhere?

  40. 40.

    Maude

    Wait until April when more cuts kick in. It won’t be pretty. Republicans in Congress will probably try to play victim.

  41. 41.

    JPL

    @John Cole: Did you close down Anne’s post or can we still comment there?

    I think those that want to use small airports for their private planes, need to pony up. I’d rather my tax money go to help those who work for minimum wage get food stamps. Oh I have an idea, how about raising the minimum wage, so I don’t even have to pay for that.

  42. 42.

    Higgs Boson's Mate

    Rep. Hartzler forgot to demand that the FAA start handing out ATC vouchers. Vouchers can solve any problem, right?

  43. 43.

    Southern Beale

    “There is plenty of waste that can be trimmed by administrators implementing the budget sequester…”

    SUCH AS? Let me guess: food stamps …. housing subsidies for the poor … Head Start ….

    Fucking Republicans are SO predictable!

  44. 44.

    gene108

    @ranchandsyrup:

    This is why we can’t have nice things. No Leftie billionaires to subsidize money losing ventures :-(

    Liberal media projects actually need to turn a profit in order to survive, which means several start ups are going to not make it.

  45. 45.

    gene108

    @Maude:

    They started playing the victim in February. They sold the sequester as “Obama’s idea” and no one in the media bothered to ask the follow-up question: You do realize, if you asshats hadn’t held the full faith and credit of the U.S. hostage in July 2011 no one would’ve proposed this idea?

    They’ve been relatively successful in deflecting some blame onto the Obama administration, because as line “sequestration was Obama’s idea” makes it way from the mouths of babes through the MSM, the not politically tuned have begun assigning some blame onto Obama, instead of 100% pinning it on the GOP where it belongs.

  48. 48.

    Valdivia

    didn’t the funding resolution that averted the govt shutdown extend the sequestration funding levels? If so the pain will definitely be felt even more by the GOP in their districts as time goes on.

    ot I have to announce that now thanks to the magic of adaptic a non-stick dressing I am happily taking care of my toe with much less problems. No longer likely I will become an alcoholic in the next 10 days! Go science :)

  50. 50.

    lol

    Surprised with all this talk of Firebaggers no one’s thought to bring up the Firebagger in Chief’s bankruptcy filing today which has revealed the vast network of right-wing bloggers she was doing business with.

  52. 52.

    ? Martin

    The state’s largest convention, SUN ‘n FUN, which is held in April at Lakeland Linder Airport, not only provides incredible economic value to Lakeland, but it serves our children by investing $1.4 million dollars annually in education. It is unacceptable to close this important control tower. Sun N Fun will now have to pay the FAA $284,000 in order to keep this control tower functioning during the convention. This is more money that they must raise that will not go to help our children who are struggling in school.

    Hmm. Let’s see, the state of Florida could just pay for their own goddamn public education? No, that can’t be it…

  54. 54.

    kerFuFFler

    ” There is plenty of waste that can be trimmed by administrators implementing the budget sequester and there is absolutely no need to put Columbia workers on unemployment because of the Obama Administration’s poor choices on where to cut.” Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO)

    Seems to me that if there is plenty of wasteful spending, she should point to a few specific examples of it or shut the F up. And if this cut is such a hardship for the citizens of Columbia MO and Montana in general, then perhaps they should raise local and state taxes to pay for adequate air traffic control. That, or elect responsible democratic representatives to national office so they can benefit from reasonable solutions instead of facing the uncomfortable realities forced on all of us by GOP obstruction.

  55. 55.

    Jay in Oregon

    @lol:
    No blog post about it yet but you are the second person to mention it in the comments. :) See @16.

  56. 56.

    khead

    Cell phones and big screen TVs?

    If you had been out on the Internets today you would know the money went to the Obama family spring break.

  57. 57.

    Mike G

    There is plenty of waste that can be trimmed

    Such as Vicky Hartzler’s (R-MO) soshulist government-run healthcare benefits. Healthcare for me, but not for thee.

  58. 58.

    Mnemosyne

    @Valdivia:

    I was kind of wondering why you weren’t using a non-stick dressing on it, but I kept finding updates on dead threads when it was too late to ask. Glad that part of the problem has been solved!

  59. 59.

    Maude

    @gene108:
    I stand corrected. The Repubs will get loud as victims and show up on Sunday shows crying the blues.
    Pentagon has cut furlough days of civilians down to 14 from 22.

  63. 63.

    lojasmo

    @taylormattd:

    Edit: she can also fuck off for never publicly apologize to ABL for her drunken, insane, front page trashing.

    Not to mention cozying up to that cooze, cornerstone.

  64. 64.

    JPL

    OT… I listened to the oral arguments and I have to admit that I had no idea that homosexuality could prevent you from immigrating to our country until 1990.

  65. 65.

    Schlemizel

    @Thor Heyerdahl:

    Good idea! He might not notice it among the 6 or 7 a day I already send him complaining about what a shitty job he is doing. I know he loves those

  67. 67.

    lojasmo

    @Ben Franklin:

    I don’t fly so fuck all y’all…

    Being on the no fly list is not a point of pride.

    ETA: Rush River’s (WI) Double Bubble IPA is delicious.

    Lojasmo +1 (and a sip)

  68. 68.

    JPL

    Another OT… Since the blog lord had a post about Rand Paul being correct once, why not O’Reilly. He seems to be softening his views on marriage equality.

    also, too. I don’t want one, just trying to make a point.

  69. 69.

    Ben Franklin

    Given Obama is pretty much *literally* the only politician in the country who tried to shut it down.

    I didn’t see this earlier, cuz, pretty much, I was literally the only commentator who wished for a result, but didn’t do a fucking thing about it.

  71. 71.

    gene108

    @taylormattd:

    Given Obama is pretty much *literally* the only politician in the country who tried to shut it down.

    The treatment of prisoners in GITMO is very much under the President’s control, as well as using military tribunals to try cases and if prisoners are found not guilty, then releasing them.

    I know some countries don’t want the detainees, so that’s held up releasing a few prisoners, but the President isn’t helpless in mitigating problems at GITMO.

    It’s like the Justice Department continuing to aggressively go after marijuana usage, the President can issue directives about what cases to emphasize and what to put on the back burner, but he’s let the career guys who want to keep up the War on Drugs have the final say and it seems like he’s deferred to others on the organization of the tribunals, the inability of GITMO detainees to have attorney-client privileges and other humanitarian failings there.

    I like Obama. I’d vote for him again, if I could. He’s good on most issues, but on issues like immigration and education he sucks.

    With immigration, he’s made it torturous for legal immigrants to continue working in this country. Immigration was always ab it of a black hole, but at least there was some predictability to it. If you needed to produce x, y and z documents to renew your visa, you knew that’s what you needed to do, even if it took a long time.

    Now, even if you produce x, y and z documents, there’s a chance an immigration official can deny your visa based their arbitrary interpretation of the rules.

    There are ways to criticize this President without being a firebagger.

    Firebaggers got the label because they want everything their way. They wanted a public option and rejected Obamacare because there’s no public option, never mind the fact Obamacare does more to move us towards the purported goal of universal healthcare than any previous law.

    The ultimate goals for closing GITMO are to (1) restore the U.S.’s place in the world as a country that does not torture and follows the rule of law and (2) to remove GITMO as a symbol to mobilize people against us. Even if you can’t close GITMO, you can mitigate the negative impressions of the place by making sure the prisoners are treated well and giving the military orders to do that is something within the President’s control.

  72. 72.

    4tehlulz

    @lol: It is quite the list, isn’t it?

    CommonSense Media’s creditors, however, span the political spectrum and include Daily Kos, Raw Story, AlterNet, Talking Points Memo, MyDD, The New Republic, Crooks and Liars, The Drudge Report, National Review Online, RedState Human Events Eagle Publishing, Town Hall Salem Communications , Five Thirty Eight, The Hill, CQ-Roll Call, Taylor Marsh, John Aravosis (AMERICAblog) and Duncan Black (Eschaton).

  74. 74.

    geg6

    Not to be too bitchy, but I find it hilarious that Jane has filed BK. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving person.

    And I, too, would love to see Tbogg given a slot here when the mood strikes him. I’ll never catch him on Twitter, just like I will never catch Cole there. Too inane a medium for me. And they are both wasting their great talents if they are concentrating mainly on that. Hell, not even my students tweet. Perhaps they are anomolous but they aren’t into it. That’s why I know my distaste for Twitter isn’t an old lady saying get off my lawn kind if thing. People who are good at writing should write and people who write as well and passionately and hilariously as Cole and Tbogg should not waste their time with such a shallow medium. I find it very disappointing. But that’s just my opinion and my problem.

  75. 75.

    Jay in Oregon

    @geg6:
    Most of TBogg’s tweets just point to the blog at FDL. But he does drop some good pithy barbs now and again.

    Cole mostly tweets about being drunk, hitting on ABL, or what actress he’s lusting after on the show or movie he’s watching. :)

  76. 76.

    RaflW

    The Republicans just keep going further and further into the hate-land:

    Kansas bill calls for HIV positive people to be quarantined:
    A bill forcing people with HIV or AIDS to be possibly isolated from society could be passed by Kansas government

    Seriously, we’ve got two countries running in some sort of weird fractal semi-parallel, one with hate as a core value, the other at least trying for some progressivism and love.

  77. 77.

    Maude

    @geg6:
    I get a lot of useful information from Twitter. It depends who you follow.
    The links provided help me in what I need to know about.

  78. 78.

    cathyx

    Where is the link to Firedoglake declaring bankruptcy? I have not heard that and I can’t find anything about it on their blog.

  79. 79.

    Tod Westlake

    The only reason they’re complaining is that this limits the number of small airports out of which they can fly their Beechcrafts. God forbid they should have to drive on roads like the rest of us.

  80. 80.

    Hill Dweller

    @quannlace:

    You mean they finally stopped bitching about the White House tours?

    The Obama daughters going to the Bahamas for spring break is now the greatest crime against humanity.

  81. 81.

    Suffern ACE

    @Maude: I think though that Ed Yong and the Museum Nerd are the only twitter stars who point me to things I wouldn’t find out in perusing three or four political blogs.

  84. 84.

    dmsilev

    @cathyx: Huffington Post story. It’s not Firedoglake that’s declaring bankruptcy, it’s an advertising network company that Jane Hamsher apparently ran at the same time. As noted above, she apparently had no qualms about doing business with the likes of RedState and Human Events.

  85. 85.

    Mr Stagger Lee

    @Maude: One of my fellow workers was let go today, but we are contractors, so I knew the haircut was coming.

  86. 86.

    Chris

    @RaflW:

    Seriously, we’ve got two countries running in some sort of weird fractal semi-parallel, one with hate as a core value, the other at least trying for some progressivism and love.

    Let us give thanks to the welfare state which, as Bismark predicted, keeps this country from going full-out civil war…

  87. 87.

    Bokonon

    “There is absolutely no need to put Columbia workers on unemployment because of the Obama Administration’s poor choices on where to cut.”

    Oh … poor choices? So it is a question of how Obama is executing the GOP’s sequester cuts, then?

    This is always the game – the GOP demands cuts, and then force Obama to implement them, and then blames Obama for the result. Attack, attack, attack. And then count on the media to bumfuzzle the story, or blame both parties.

    Remember – in wingnut land, the bad stuff that happens is ALWAYS OBAMA’s FAULT. Even when it happens to be a direct result of the GOP’s own agenda.

  88. 88.

    ChrisNYC

    @geg6: You must have missed TBogg’s tweet about the horsemeat in Ikea swedish meatballs. HI – Larious.

  89. 89.

    cathyx

    @ranchandsyrup: If you’re going to say that firedoglake and Jane Hamsher are filing for bankruptcy, then you should list the rest of the creditors mentioned:

    Daily Kos, Raw Story, AlterNet, Talking Points Memo, MyDD, The New Republic, Crooks and Liars, The Drudge Report, National Review Online, RedState Human Events Eagle Publishing, Town Hall Salem Communications , Five Thirty Eight, The Hill, CQ-Roll Call, Taylor Marsh, John Aravosis (AMERICAblog) and Duncan Black (Eschaton)

  90. 90.

    Maude

    @Mr Stagger Lee:
    I’m so sorry. It hurts to hear it.

    @Suffern ACE:
    I don’t follow politics on Twitter. I follow John and a couple of others, but mainly other kinds of sites like the National Park Service, NASA, wildlife refuges and so on.
    The State Dept said Kerry is in France. He’s busy.

  91. 91.

    Mr Stagger Lee

    @raven: Has the Good Senator Isaksen vistited Fort Benning, Fort Gordon or Robins AFB yet? I bet he would hear a different song from those workers. I wonder if Ted Cruz has the stones to visit Fort Hood, Fort Bliss or some of those so called moochers in uniform?

  92. 92.

    MattR

    @JPL: eh. O’Reilly may have pointed out how weak the argument is against same sex marriage, but he is still fine with individual states choosing to discriminate against its citizens.

    @gene108: As of Nov 2012 there were 166 prisoners in Gitmo. 86 are deemed safe to release, but we cannot find a place willing to take them (that won’t execute them). 46 are too dangerous for release but not subject to prosecution. 24 are still having their cases reviews. 7 are currently facing trial while another 3 have been convicted.

  93. 93.

    RaflW

    @J.:

    I totally agree that the Republicans are assclowns, and the FAA and the sequester is full GOP bluster bullcrap.

    That said, closing some of these towers, such as Danbury, is likely to be no big deal.
    Danbury had 5 (Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) arrivals today, and 3 IFR departures. None of them airline flights. These were either biz flights or serious pilots wanting to fly in controlled airspace or be tracked for safety.

    Small airports often operate with pilots announcing their movements and monitoring their radios for other trafic in the pattern, w/o a tower. The reason pilots fly a patter in and out is so that they’ll be visible in a predictable way.
    So I don’t think Danbury will become a site of frequent flaming wreckage.

    Basically if a pilot is flying IFR, they’ll have to join the air traffic system to make their flight, so they’ll integrate with scheduled air service and be under ATC control as they travel cross-country. Its just not as scary as it sounds to not have a local tower operating for local light aircraft traffic.

    Also what MikeJ said.

  94. 94.

    Maude

    Tucker Carlson is getting a Fox morning show or going to be a host on a Fox morning show that exists. Tell lies and you get rewarded.

  96. 96.

    Lurking Canadian

    @kerFuFFler: This. Holy shit. The Republicans, over and over, say “Obama must lead on cuts!”. So he does. Then they say, “No, no, he’s cutting the wrong stuf instead of going after all the waste and fraud!”

    If only, if ONLY, there were some kind of legislative body in which the Republicans could share in governing the country, maybe some kind of…Assembly of Delegates, or something, that had control of the public purse. Maybe then they’d have a chance to arrest Obama’s one-man rule.

  97. 97.

    Mnemosyne

    @Lurking Canadian:

    If only, if ONLY, there were some kind of legislative body in which the Republicans could share in governing the country, maybe some kind of…Assembly of Delegates, or something, that had control of the public purse. Maybe then they’d have a chance to arrest Obama’s one-man rule.

    I dunno, I’m pretty sure that’s against the Constitution.

  100. 100.

    schrodinger's cat

    @gene108:

    Now, even if you produce x, y and z documents, there’s a chance an immigration official can deny your visa based their arbitrary interpretation of the rules.

    Do you have any data supporting your assertion here? Also,
    how is the President responsible for how a consular officer interprets the rules.

  101. 101.

    Higgs Boson's Mate

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    Wonder what the deficit would look like if we cut back federal aid to the Red states until it just equaled the amount that they contribute in federal taxes.

  103. 103.

    Original Lee

    @Hill Dweller: And I wonder why the hell we even know about this. I don’t think we ever knew where the Bush daughters went until after they got back, if then. I don’t think we ever knew where Chelsea went. I don’t think we ever knew where Amy went.

    Oh, right, Sasha and Malia are blah and therefore can’t have nice things, even though their parents are able to pay tuition for two kids at Sidwell Friends.

  104. 104.

    Gravenstone

    @Original Lee: In this specific case, apparently a wingnut in the Bahamas took a pic of the Obama girls at the resort, and forwarded it to Drudge, thus kicking off the wingnut firestorm du jour. As one commenter here noted, it was apparently just fine for the wingnut to vacation there, but beyond the pale for the Obama family.

    And I recall at least one occasion of the Bush girls behaving rather poorly whilst abroad. Of course, I also recall the wingnuts of the day arguing vociferously that “kids will be kids” and that we should collectively mind our own bidness in the matter.

  105. 105.

    AndoChronic

    Burn this bitch to the ground!… I’m 1st class on the Titanic, ha-ha, so I’ll be spared.

  107. 107.

    cathyx

    @JPL: Well, it actually would be better if the creditor that is filing for bankruptcy were Bank of America. But it’s instead all those blogs who put up money. So to criticize Hamsher and not the rest for the bankruptcy, like she’s the one who can’t make a go of it because of her bad politics, is not fair.

  108. 108.

    Mnemosyne

    @Original Lee:

    Oh, right, Sasha and Malia are blah and therefore can’t have nice things, even though their parents are able to pay tuition for two kids at Sidwell Friends.

    Yes, but they pay that using DA PEEPLES MUNNY!1! (aka the president’s salary) so therefore every citizen gets to bitch about what the president chooses to spend his salary on.

  109. 109.

    AxelFoley

    @lol:

    Surprised with all this talk of Firebaggers no one’s thought to bring up the Firebagger in Chief’s bankruptcy filing today which has revealed the vast network of right-wing bloggers she was doing business with.

    Just read about it.

    MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

  111. 111.

    Suffern ACE

    @Mnemosyne: and about 27% were planning on taking a spring break trip to Washington this week, which is now ruined so the obamas can party.

  115. 115.

    JPL

    @cathyx: Creditors are normally owed money. I don’t think it likely that Jane and Drudge would own the same company but who knows.

  116. 116.

    Valdivia

    @Mnemosyne:

    apparently it was a mistake by the nurse who gave me the package. The doctor couldn’t believe I had been using regular gauze. Now it’s so much easier. :)

  118. 118.

    Todd

    Was common sense a purveyor of banner ads that pop up according to the algorithm of the topic of the viewed page?

  119. 119.

    IowaOldLady

    I thought one of the points of the sequester was that it was supposed to cut equally across all departments. If the FAA has to cut, then it’s going to cut stuff connected to air travel. Food stamps aren’t in that budget.

  124. 124.

    The Moar You Know

    Kansas bill calls for HIV positive people to be quarantined:
    A bill forcing people with HIV or AIDS to be possibly isolated from society could be passed by Kansas government

    @RaflW: And they’ll find out what those of us with memory and a working brain remember finding out in the mid-1980s – there’s a hell of a lot of folks with HIV who aren’t dirty pervert queers.

    Dies a quick death in committee.

  128. 128.

    fuckwit

    the real genius of obama is his ability to not lose his cool, get flustered, and tell these morons to kiss his ass.

  129. 129.

    Console

    @Walker:

    Binghamton has an approach control. So altogether, their airspace traffic is probably more than Ithaca. Even if Binghamton airport itself is slow. Plus, even if you close the tower, the approach control function still has to be performed, so you have to put the infrastructure in somewhere, divvy up the airspace, train people in the new facility to work it etc. etc. Pain in the ass.

    That’s not to say that contract towers won’t be on the chopping block first anyways. Closing down an FAA tower requires like a year notice for the controllers and it tends to cost money in the short term (and sometimes the long term because those FAA controllers don’t up and vanish… they go to bigger facilities). Closing down a contract tower can be done unilaterally assuming there isn’t a political shitstorm. So no matter how busy the contract tower, they are going to get the ax over any FAA tower.

    *In my opinion, not speaking from a position of authority, blah blah blah

  131. 131.

    Console

    @Starlit:

    Well, they can’t really increase beyond 22 days because that starts the “reduction in force” requirements of the government, which is a gigantic pain in the ass. I believe that the continuing resolution made it easier for the DOD to shuffle money around so they now don’t have to furlough people as much.

  132. 132.

    Another Halocene Human

    @Maude: It’s already happening. Wage freeze at the VA blamed on Obama. Yeah, he signed the order, because he’s the president, but the reason is that the House wants to cut Social Security and the Senate and President are still saying no. If you’re not blaming Boehner you’re not paying attention.

  136. 136.

    sparrow

    @RaflW: I was born in Kansas and spent my first 11 years there. Shit like this makes me not sorry I live in Baltimore now.

  137. 137.

    Deb T

    @Gravenstone:

    I think it’s one of their attempts at misdirection about the effects of the sequester. I say good for the Obama girls. Hope they have fun. They deserve it. It’s not easy being the daughter of the President. I hope they get spa treatments, new clothes, non-alcoholic frou frou drinks, great seafood. I hope they are staying in the best room ever. I hope the get flirted with and are able to flirt back. Most of all, I hope they have fun. Go girls, go.

    Shame on the cranky, petty, poisonous Repuglycans.

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