Here at the Lester & Charlie Institute of Forward Thinking, we love to track current events! Though sometimes things get in the way. Such as Hurricane Sandy, who came, saw and conquered as if she had memorized the script that those pagan scientists, meteorologists and computer simulators had written for her. One of the side effects was grounding the planes that were shuttling the presidential campaigns into the last few days of the election cycle -- which we thought was the only current event left.
But wait. Did it really grind the campaign to a halt or did it give each candidate a chance to show how they respond to emergencies? Even before the storm hit, and just based on those predictions from the pagans, President Obama made it abundantly clear that the federal government was there for the states and that he had an open phone line available to governors with a blank storm relief checkbook sitting next to it. He instructed federal agencies, even the deservedly maligned FEMA, to get off their butts and start moving.
Did someone say FEMA or federal funds? The Romney campaign certainly heard it, and for the Romney campaign, them's fightin' words. Romney is on record for stating (read: soon denying) his conviction that FEMA and all federal emergency aid should be cut for being immoral and that the responsibility for disaster relief should be shifted to the all-knowing states -- because they are so much better equipped to take care of their own. States like... well, pick any Red State. Almost all of them hate taxes and hate the federal government but are always first in line for federal handouts when disaster strikes. Disasters seem to strike Red States more often than others -- in spite of their close connections to Jesus and his pet dinosaur angels!
For the record, let's note that most federal tax revenue comes from Blue States and gets sent to Red States, who claim they don't want it but still take it even though it's sooooo socialist. But even New Jersey's governor, Chris Christie -- a man who never met a conservative policy he wouldn't swallow -- praised Obama for stepping up to the plate and using the forces of good (federal money) to counteract the forces of (nature's) evil.
So how did Romney weather this storm? He pitched in! He got some supporters in Ohio to donate a bunch of bottled water and diapers and cans of tomato puree to the Red Cross and he even helped load up the goods in a Penske rental truck! A truck that, by now, has most likely veered off a shovel-ready bridge project that Congress wouldn't let Obama fix -- because it would require socialist federal funds.
Good job, Mitt!
Oh, but wait. While the Red Cross, which has been raising money even longer than Jerry Lewis -- if that's possible -- expressed tepid gratitude for the donation, the organization makes it abundantly clear on its website that this kind of donation "impedes the valuable resources of money, time, and personnel" because it has to be processed and dealt with. What they really want is donations of blood and money. Money allows the relief team that's working on the ground -- the only folks who can see what's really going on in real time -- to decide whether the millions of victims without homes, power and/or medicine really need tomato puree, or, say, insulin. And then go out and buy it. From somewhere close.
Hmm. That's kind of like Obama's storm relief checkbook!
This gets a person's imagination stirring faster than the spoon in Christine O'Donnell's big black witch's kettle. Imagine it's two years from now and a Katrina- or Sandy-like disaster hits the U.S. Given what we know about him, how would a President Romney make sure that the innocent, needy victims are taken care of? What steps would he take first?