GOP to cut 40% from hurricane forecasting

[Atreus21]

In your intellectually lacking opinion.

Please. Elaborate on this.

 

[CPA]

Do you want America to just barely survive, or you want it to remain an advanced, developed, country?

lol, because America will be literally blown off the map without hurricane flights.

 

[dainthomas]

I'll go out on a limb any say the Republicans(see below OP) are getting the wrong message from God. The correct message just may be, keep screwing the people and you will see directly what can result.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=32196975&postcount=1


The GOP has a distinct history of cutting support for programs that are directly related to public safety and it comes back relatively soon to bite them and all of us in the ass.

Late 2004 the Bush administration cut funding requested by the Army Corps of Engineers for New Orleans. Less then 1 year later we had Katrina.
http://www.factcheck.org/article344.html



http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/08/26/hurricane_funding


And now they want to cut funding to the hurricane hunter flights...


During Hurricane Irene, Eric Cantor said we have to have budget cuts to fund FEMA. Interesting stance since we are in the heart of hurricane season. For the sake of the country I hope the Republican streak ends here.

If they cut funding for the Near Earth Object Program, I'm moving into NORAD.

 

[trenchfoot]

Yeah, let's cut out some from all of the programs that benefit the general public and while we're at it, let's also cut out all those tax loopholes that benefit only the very rich and the corporations they own. Deal?

 

[Throckmorton]

How on earth did humans even survive before we had hurricane forecasts?

How did you survive Katrina, Mr New Orleans?

 

[Throckmorton]

Liberal mentality: Cut this program and CHAOS! The Weather Channel won't work any more!

Are you fucking stupid?

 

[Ausm]

How on earth did humans even survive before we had hurricane forecasts?

What did God create first man or hurricane?

 

[Ausm]

If they cut the military by 40% I would be all for it.

 

[Fern]

First, the thread title is wrong/misleading due to omission.

Read this from the article:

Of course, America's Republican-demanded White House-encouraged austerity budget includes cuts to the NOAA. Cuts that will delay -- by years -- the construction and launch of an extreme weather forecasting satellite. So let's hope there aren't any serious hurricanes in 2016, I guess?

So, if I understand the article correctly, they are saying the WH encouraged this? Yet (not) amazingly the WH/Dems are absent from the headline. And the rest of the article too.

Also of question is the use of the term "cuts". What's been cut according the article is a NEW satellite. Accordingly, NOAA could be getting even more money next year and there may not be any cuts at all. You don't buy new satellites each year.

I think it of concern, if as the person claims, we'd face a period of time without a satellite asset, but I'd like hear others' opinions on that.

Otherwise, looks a lot like another (political) spin article. Why can't we have an article that says the GOP and WH are not going to approve a brand new satellite for NOAA and then opinions from both sides about any possible future loss of satellite help. It may be that others feel the existing satellite will last sufficiently long.

IMO, the remarks below shouldn't be included unless you're doing a political op ed (so, I guess that what this is, too bad not labeled as such0:

This is an old story: Before or after a natural disaster, you can usually find a Republican who wanted to cut funding for departments and organizations that predicted and protected people from said disaster.

Remember when Louisiana governor and poor public speaker mocked the concept of funding for "volcano monitoring" and then a volcano promptly erupted in Alaska? And remember how after Eric Cantor pushed for across-the-board budget cuts for the United States Geological Survey, his district was hit with an earthquake? And remember how the House Republican budget cut funding to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and then there was an earthquake and tsunami in Japan?

This crap has nothing to do with the satellite issue.

Fern

 

[fskimospy]

Fern, it's a Salon.com article. They are a self described online tabloid.

 

[Infohawk]

I want it to remain an advanced, developed country.

Which does not have anything to do with our ability to forecast or not forecast hurricanes.

Being advanced means minimizing property damage and injuries death due to hurricanes, doesn't it? What does being developed or advanced mean to you?

 

[TheClaw]

The Hurricane Hunters collect invaluable information on the hurricanes that is then used to fairly accurately forecast the path of the hurricane. Without this information we will have shitty track forecasts. If you thought Irene was over-hyped, wait until there is no flight data in the forecasts.

People who know nothing about science should not be making policies on it.

 

[rudder]

Shit, now we wont know when hurricanes are coming!

yeh the satellites will fall out of the sky and the weather channel people will be blind!

 

[DrPizza]

How on earth did humans even survive before we had hurricane forecasts?

Before we had good hurricane forecasting, hurricanes such as the Galveston hurricane of 1900 killed 8-12 THOUSAND people. And, these weren't dumbasses who refused to evacuate when told to - they didn't have a clue it was coming. Most modern hurricanes only kill in the dozens of people - the hurricane that struck your location recently being an exception due to an abundance of stupid people who refused to evacuate. Speaking of stupid people at your location...

 

[Atreus21]

NEvermind. I'm being an asshat.

 

[feralkid]

yeh the satellites will fall out of the sky and the weather channel people will be blind!

Not if we pray hard enough.

 

[Craig234]

Fern, it's a Salon.com article. They are a self described online tabloid.

I'm not sure what that means, but they're not a 'tabloid' in terms of being like the 'aliens disguised as American's cats and dogs' type tabloid.

They're a 'serious' political publisher along with quite a bit more frivolous, but not in the 'trashy tabloid' manner.

They have been headed by Joan Walsh who is a regular political television commentator, publish Glenn Greenwald, have had journalists like Eric Bohlert.

They've broken serious stories such as co-breaking the Abu Ghraib photos (with CBS IIRC).

Generally they're a fine reference source.

On other things, they can be a bit 'amateur hour', but that's pretty harmless; television commentary, advice column, and so on. So do newspapers.

 

[Siddhartha]

I'll go out on a limb any say the Republicans(see below OP) are getting the wrong message from God. The correct message just may be, keep screwing the people and you will see directly what can result.
http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=32196975&postcount=1


The GOP has a distinct history of cutting support for programs that are directly related to public safety and it comes back relatively soon to bite them and all of us in the ass.

Late 2004 the Bush administration cut funding requested by the Army Corps of Engineers for New Orleans. Less then 1 year later we had Katrina.
http://www.factcheck.org/article344.html



http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2011/08/26/hurricane_funding


And now they want to cut funding to the hurricane hunter flights...


During Hurricane Irene, Eric Cantor said we have to have budget cuts to fund FEMA. Interesting stance since we are in the heart of hurricane season. For the sake of the country I hope the Republican streak ends here.

When they talk about "small federal government" this is what they have to be talking about.

 

[Rainsford]

The federal budget has to be cut; nothing should be exempt; Save the Hurricane flights; then take those cuts funds and add them to another program to gut even worse.

The time has come to pay the piper; both sides agreed to that concept.

Well, I'd agree that nothing should be exempt from CONSIDERATION. But responsible budgeting shouldn't involve just taking a chainsaw to random parts of the budget. If we really want to balance the budget, Congress needs to go through everything we spend money on and come up with a cost/benefit analysis for each item. Then cut non-essential programs that don't give us good return on our investment. If that process has been done and resulted in what Republicans frequently seem to want to cut, I'd be amazed.

 

[trenchfoot]

When they talk about "small federal government" this is what they have to be talking about.

Given their past performance, the Repubs have two distinct versions of "small government": The one that is devoid of any social programs, regulatory agencies, immoral gov't sponsored research programs and any Dept. that cannot be corrupted in a way that serves the rich; in other words, their idelogical wet dream come true. The other version is the one that is totally bloated and occupied by party loyalists, corporate owned lackys, trusted friends and family members and the intelligence agencies and military services that is the extended eyes, ears, mouth and iron fist of the profiteering corporations. Oh yeah, let's not forget a judiciary that is completely populated by Christian Fundamentalists and corporate owned and trained lawyers.

 

[Rainsford]

lol, because America will be literally blown off the map without hurricane flights.

And people survived just fine when we all lived in grass huts...that's not an argument to get rid of modern building materials.

 

[Jhhnn]

What part of "we are out of money, we need to make cuts" do you dimlibs not understand? Money does not grow on trees. If someone wants to keep the funding for the hurricane hunters, that's great, show me what to cut then.

Is there anything other than spending more money that democrats support?

We aren't out of money- we just refuse to tax our rich appropriately, in line with the rest of the first world.

That won't solve everything, but it's a start in the right direction. It's all too easy for those at the top to demand austerity from the rest of us while they sacrifice nothing. Lead by example, gentlemen- make some sacrifices of your own. It's not like you can't afford it.

There's no reason everything has to be Cut, cut, cut! other than the raving anti-gubmint ideology of the Right.

Maybe we could reduce some of the Ag subsidies to save money- I haven't noticed any farm state Repubs calling for any sacrifice by their own wealthiest contributors...

Or maybe we could look at some truly radical tax changes, like this-

http://www.apttax.com/

 

[Rainsford]

What part of "we are out of money, we need to make cuts" do you dimlibs not understand? Money does not grow on trees. If someone wants to keep the funding for the hurricane hunters, that's great, show me what to cut then.

Is there anything other than spending more money that democrats support?

There's a big different between "we need to make cuts" and "we need to make THIS cut" that you don't seem to understand. And the method of saying you'll cut something unless people find a better place to cut sounds like a suspicious combination of blackmail and total laziness.

 

[Bitek]

It's a shame the majority of those hurricane-prone coastal states vote R.

God keeps trying to flush them all away but they keep sticking to the bowl

 

[Whiskey16]

A federal sales tax, Yanks.

You prove to be so fiscally and socially inept, it is time to grow up into a mature and fiscally conservative state that has the rational and responsibility to handle the fundamentals of modern finance.

Unfortunately this will not happen with a generally stupid population and pandering plus incompetent idealogues as chosen representatives.

The maturity and responsbility is lacking to both implement responsible but tough budget cuts in concert with a rise in taxes.