 | Ron Paul Votes Against Improving Levees Post-Katrina |
It’s just a little over two years since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and sent destructive economic shock waves throughout the American economy. The United States is still trying to get back to where it was before Hurricane Katrina. Already, some Republicans seem to have forgotten all about Hurricane Katrina, and is determined to repeat the mistakes that made the disaster worse.
It wasn’t just the hurricane itself that killed and destroyed, after all. Inadequate levees broke when they should have held, and sent waters into neighborhoods that were supposed to be protected.
In spite of all this, George W. Bush has vetoed a bill, the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA), that would fund levees and other projects to protect people from hurricanes and catastrophic floods. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi explains that, “In New Orleans, where the damage is already done, WRDA is essential to rebuilding that great city.”
So great is the need for the Water Resources Development Act that 138 Republicans in the House of Representatives joined with congressional democrats to override Bush’s veto of the legislation. Unfortunately, many Republicans went along with Bush’s absurd opposition to the bill. Every single one of the members of the House who voted against the Water Resources Development Act were Republicans.
Among those was Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul. I can’t for the life of me think of what excuse he can come up with for opposing this bill. Could Ron Paul really say with a straight face that spending on levees is wasteful, after what we saw during Hurricane Katrina? Would Ron Paul seriously pull out his tired old libertarian line that this kind of congressional spending is unconstitutional, in spite of the Constitution’s explicit endorsement of congressional action for the general welfare of the American people?
Any candidate who supports the neglects of America’s defenses against Hurricanes like Katrina is not fit to become President of the United States. It’s too late to vote against George W. Bush for President. It is not too late to vote against Ron Paul for President.
(Sources: Library of Congress; Nancy Pelosi press release, November 2, 2007)
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Maybe Ron Paul’s against all Federal Government action and believes that the city/state government should protect itself? Get people less dependant on the Federal Government? That’s not even a constitutional argument, it’s just a belief that state governments handle things better (and the federal government isn’t required to do projects that wholly reside within a state).
Then again, maybe he’s just against people building in areas that are naturally dangerous, and thinks it’s a waste of money to rebuild in New Orleans where it’s prone to being flooded.
Comment by Joseph — 11/7/2007 @ 11:28 am
Ron Paul believes that the Constitution does not authorize Congress to spend money in this manner. It’s that simple. And I agree. I see nothing in the Constitution that authorized Congress or the President to give money or aid to small groups of people. Individuals are perfectly capable of either purchasing insurance to protect them from catastrophes or living in an area of the US that is catastrophe free. Really why should someone who lives in Michigan (relatively catastrophe free!) have to fund the rebuilding of New Orleans or pay for new homes in California? The simple answer is that they shouldn’t. It’s theft. Nothing more, nothing less.
Comment by malazon — 11/7/2007 @ 11:40 am
Malazon, if Ron Paul believes that, he has no position being in the federal government, because he’s clearly wrong. It’s that simple. The Constitution authorizes Congress to act in the general welfare. Hurricane Katrina showed quite clearly that protection through levees is in the general welfare, not just in the welfare of small numbers of people.
Joseph, if Ron Paul believes what you say he believes, then he shouldn’t be President.
History is against your argument - the federal government neglected levees, and disaster fell. When federal government wasn’t involved, the results weren’t the great fantasy Ron Paul’s ideology would predict.
Besides, water problems are interstate problems, especially when you’re dealing with long river systems like the Mississippi. Ask people who were in the Midwest in the great floods of the early 1990s if they think that levees should be piecemeal state and local productions.
Comment by J. Clifford — 11/7/2007 @ 11:49 am
Article I, Section 8, malazon. See “General Welfare.”
Comment by Jim — 11/7/2007 @ 12:04 pm
If ROn Paul should act in the general welfare, then he’s doing so. It is not a good idea to rebuild things which are prone to being destroyed again, it’d be in the general welfare interest to not rebuild and have a community grow and live in impending doom. Although, no one will go for this, cause tof the cultural significance of New Orleans. Sometimes Cultural significance isn’t worth people lives, but it isn’t the federal governments decision either way.
The general welfare means making sure things are in place so the states can take control of their own issues, not doing it for them. The Feds job is to make sure the overall system is sustainable, cause if it isn’t, then we’ll have no country to debate about this tomrrow. I don’t understand how someone for sustainable fuels and resources can be against sustainable government. Currently, our government is NOT sustainable and will inevitabley crash like Oil will. Ron paul wants to prevent this, and it’s gonna take some hard work.
Alex Merced - A Civil Paultard
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Comment by Alex Merced — 11/7/2007 @ 12:20 pm
Maybe he thinks it does not make sense to build a city that is open to the sea, sets next to the largest river in America and is several feet under sea level.
May he thinks we would be better off not throwing good money after bad. MAYBE HE REALIZES THAT WE ARE BROKE!
Comment by CaneCat5 — 11/7/2007 @ 12:41 pm
Well, malazon, why then does the Federal government bail out the airlines (post 911) and the banking industry and others following the sub-prime mortgage meltdown (and before that the Savings and Loan industry when another Bush screwed that up)?
Comment by Tom — 11/7/2007 @ 12:41 pm
If I may take a minute just to piss off the libertarians with a moment of progressive optimism instead of rehashing the same points about “general welfare” again.
Any individual social assistance program that survives the Bush administration can be considered golden for a decade at least, as we will not be electing another president with such a heartless greedy idealism.
Comment by hendrixbot — 11/7/2007 @ 1:21 pm
So, then, by Alex’s standard, it was a really good idea not to fix that bridge in Minnesota that collapsed, because it was going to collapse anyway. So, there was no problem, really, when the bridge fell down and people died when their cars plunged into the Mississippi River. They should have known better, travelling on a bridge, which as everyone knows from the song “London Bridge” are prone to falling down.
If the federal government should pass the buck to the states, then why shouldn’t the states pass the buck to local governments, and then the local governments just tell people to take care of any problems themselves?
That’s the standard of Alex and Ron Paul. I choose to reject that standard.
Comment by J. Clifford — 11/7/2007 @ 1:23 pm
The bridge analogy is misleading. That was due to poor engineering and the typical use of it causing it to be destroyed. The levees in New Orleans were designed KNOWING that the area was below sea level, hurricanes, and prone to flooding. Anyone who knowingly moves into those conditions should expect the chance of disaster. The Federal government, after the area was destroyed, should not be ENABLING people to be stupid by wasting our money to rebuild levees.
I appreciate the arguments that social welfare programs are good, as they are actually relevent to the discussion, as is the idea that the federal government has/should bail out some key industries when disaster strikes.
The argument, however, that Ron Paul, because of his beliefs, is not fit to be President, is based on a false assumption. The Constitution, DOES NOT SAY that Congress is REQUIRED TO PROVIDE FOR THE GENERAL WELFARE. It says that Congress has the “POWER” to. Which is a CONCURRENT power. Which means that if the members of Congress decide that it’s a bad idea to provide for the general welfare, they don’t have to. Stop repeating the same lie/assumption that Congress is REQUIRED to provide for the general welfare. They aren’t.
Comment by Joseph — 11/7/2007 @ 4:09 pm
the federal government is not bailing out sub-prime mortgages. That is the Federal Reserve and it has no connection to the government.
Besides go look up how Chicago was rebuilt after the great fire. Private businesses and businessmen as well as donations from around the country. There was no government involvement. Read up on history and you’ll see that people weren’t dependent on the federal government for the first 150 years of this nations existence.
Comment by jeff — 11/7/2007 @ 6:21 pm
http://www.usconstitution.net/glossary.html#WELFARE
Comment by jeff — 11/7/2007 @ 6:23 pm
You should probably watch this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muHg86Mys7I
I tried posting it in the comments of the Liberal Values post that links here, but the admin was so frightened he censored my comment.
Comment by disinter — 11/7/2007 @ 11:05 pm
“You own your own life. To deny this is to imply that someone else has a higher claim on your life than you do”…ha, ha, ha. Now if instead of that little stick figure of a man with the turbulent music in the background, they showed a little stick figure of a woman, wouldn’t that piss off the libertarians? See, Ron Paul doesn’t believe in abortion. That is because according to Ron Paul’s ideology a FETUS has a higher claim on a woman’s own life than she herself does.
Comment by Iroquois — 11/7/2007 @ 11:46 pm
Iroquois - his favorite color probably isn’t the same as yours either. What is your point?
Comment by disinter — 11/8/2007 @ 12:21 am
Also, the cute little video said NOTHING of CORPORATIONS which now do all those things humans are not supposed to do: fraud, enslave and steal AND GET AWAY WITH IT because corporations, though they are somehow entitled to have a voice in government (which i believe is the root of the problem) are not human, have no allegiance to a country or to the people it employs.
Jeff, your statement that the Fed has NO connection to the government is not true. They may make independent rate changes involved in the banking sector, but their effect is on our currency, the very life-blood of the economy, and thereby it has a direct effect on the government. Who bailed out the airline industries after 911?
Comment by Tom — 11/8/2007 @ 7:35 am
I know this is a bit late in the argument, but I think he may have voted against it because of the increase of bureaucracy in such an organization. Also the lack of structure the bill also presented. The reason he voted against the money for FEMA to help Hurricane victims is because it was just throwing money at the problem. He has suggested several other bills to help the area such as tax incentives. Being a victim of hurricane Katrina, I saw all of the corruption that came from the large somes of money being thrown into the state and unregulated. I know of people buying big screen TV’s with tax money. Also there were several programs that received federal funding that were almost bankrupt by the time they started distributing money. I would like to see some Louisiana politicians’ bank accounts now. (Or their freezers.) Ron Paul just realized that we are probably the most corrupt state in the union and realized how specific money needs to be given to us. Sorry for that my state made so much federal money disappear without a large difference.
In summary of above:
1. I am a hurricane victim that saw the reason Ron Paul voted against the first budget to help us. (Because of lack of structure.)
2. And he did care about us as he has tried other programs. (Even some of his own ideas.)
3. He probably voted against this cause it would create another opportunity for money thrown at us to disappear in government contracts.
Comment by Patrick — 12/15/2007 @ 6:59 am
Patrick, can you name for me one bill in Congress giving assistance for victims of Hurricane Katrina that Ron Paul did vote for? Give me the name or number of the bill, Patrick.
Comment by J. Clifford — 12/15/2007 @ 7:58 am