So, post-Rita and Katrina, it seems that we've discovered the obvious—that we're generally ill-prepared to evacuate major metropolitan areas. So, in a story by an AP writer discussing this issue, where does she focus? Mayors of several metropolitan cities? Emergency preparedness planners from the same cities?
Are you kidding me? Nowadays, we all run to the federal government for our every need. And rather than accepting only their actual constitutional responsibilities and pointing out what their "enumerated powers" actually are, they're quite eagerly accepting the job of planning emergency preparedness for everyone in the whole bloody country. All 295,734,134 of us. Shucks—should be a piece of cake.
President Bush has ordered the Homeland Security Department to review disaster plans for every major metropolitan area. Experts say the slow pace of evacuations in Houston and New Orleans show the need for changes to get people out of harm's way in a more urgent emergency.
"You have to accept the possibility that a major portion of the people will be left behind," said Roger Cressey, a former anti-terrorism official in the Clinton and Bush administrations. "You may have to write some of them off in far larger numbers than people realize."
Perhaps we could just fund the states and cities and let them do the planning? I mean, they know their people, areas, and circumstances much better than some bureaucrat in Washington, don't they? Not to mention that they might not be quite so ready to "write off" some of their citizens. Oh, wait...
Cressey said the answer is not simply giving local governments more money to improve emergency operation plans.
Lawmakers said they plan to address the issue.
Oh, oh. They're gonna "address the issue."
Have you ever—ever—heard of Congress refusing to take action—i.e. "spend your money"—on any issue, saying, "that's a job for state and local governments?"
"You would think four years after 9/11 with billions of dollars spent to improve our emergency preparedness that the response to Katrina would be far crisper, far better coordinated and not marred by failures at all levels of government," said GOP Sen. Susan Collins (news, bio, voting record) of Maine, who heads the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
Cressey said there must be plans in place to move the poor and disadvantaged. Thousands of them were left behind in New Orleans after Katrina.
Hear me, loyal readers. Virtually every member of Congress, indeed the president himself, has has broken the oath of office that each one "solemnly swore," namely, to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."
The wording is slightly different for Senators and members of Congress, but it amounts to the same thing. And, with a very few exceptions, they all break it. Actually they pulverize it beyond recognition.
That constitution you swore to defend has a tenth amendment, people. Remember your high-school civics class? It goes like this:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
This is probably the most routinely ignored sentence in the entire Constitution. I'd be willing to bet that no one reading this has ever heard his/her congressman¹—or any congressman, for that matter—mention this sentence for any reason, much less to argue against federal involvement in someone's local affairs. The result of 229 years of this, as we're all aware, is a federal government that employs more people nationwide than any private employer, anywhere.
This is obscene.
And the most overt, shameless example of violating this oath of office is the president himself, when he signed the McCain-Feingold Campaign "Finance Reform" and Back-door Assault on the First Amendment bill. Bush himself expressed his reservations about the bill's unconstitutional restrictions on free political speech, but "hoping" that the SCOTUS would trim out the objectional parts, he signed it anyway. Sheesh. If ever there was a clear example of dereliction of duty, this was it.
In fact, the president had already promised to veto the bill on national television while George Will interviewed him—on 23 Jan 2000, on ABC's This Week. He had built a reputation for actually keeping his campaign promises, but he now betrayed the people who voted for him in a calculated political move that didn't exactly go as planned.
Because, in a ruling that doubtless dismayed the president and floored me (although I'm sure that many more politically astute people were not surprised at all), the SCOTUS upheld these restrictions on political speech (finding unconstitutional only a provision prohibiting minors from making contributions to candidates and parties).
I don't know about you, but I don't appreciate being betrayed. It puts me in a bad mood.
Actually, I'm digressing badly from my original point, except that this illustrates how government officials don't keep their oath of office foremost in their minds when making decisions. They makes their deals and they takes their chances—only it's us that gets screwed when things go like this. And most of the time it's their best interests, not ours, that are advanced even when things go "right." If it insures and/or expands the amount of power they have over us, the states, or anyone, it's a good thing and they'll find some way to sneak it in, if necessary, and vote for it. All "for the people," of course.
It's enough to make a guy just give up trying to influence government leaders in any way. They're gonna do whatever they can to maintain and expand their reach, no matter what I say (not that I'm anyone special). (Sigh...)
Wait a minute—the whole idea of having to be "someone special" in order to influence government was part of what we fought the Revolutionary War over, wasn't it? Well, wasn't it?
What happened? We've obviously lost control over our own government, and much control over our own lives. And it happened so slowly that we didn't see it coming and stop it when we had the chance. In particular, we allowed the executive branch (the presidency) to almost completely bypass the legislative branch (congress) by establishing bureaucracies such as the FDA, EPA, FCC, OSHA, etc., etc., etc. that have authority over our lives, make up their own laws as they go, and seem accountable to no one. Did you ever vote for the head of, or members of, the FDA? Are their rules and regulations, to which we all must submit (like it or not), ever brought up for public debate? In what way can it be said, even loosely, that this huge part of our governance is "democracy?"
Well, maybe I'm in denial, but I'm too bloody well angry to give up yet. _______________________________________________________________________
¹I'm using the male gender generically, of course, which is perfectly correct English. Sometimes I give in to political correctness and say "his/her," but honestly, it's a waste of space and time to do that every dang time I mention someone who could be either female or male. I trust you all realize that I, or anyone else who does so, is hardly sexist for doing it.
(Hat tip to Ralph Bristol.)
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