3 LA GOPers Voted Against Sandy Aid, But They Sure Want Flood Money Now (All Deniers, BTW)

[hatrack]

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That point may have been lost on three Louisiana congressmen when they voted against a $50.5-billion relief package for the victims of Superstorm Sandy. The 2012 storm ravaged coastal communities in New Jersey and New York. Now they’re in the position of needing the same sort of aid for their own state. How will that play out?

The three lawmakers, all Republicans, are Rep. Steve Scalise (currently the House majority whip); Bill Cassidy, who moved up to the Senate last year; and John Fleming. They’re all likely exemplars of another Washington truism: fiscal responsibility is great, until it’s your own district that’s getting fiscally hammered. Then Job One becomes working to “help the residents of the threatened areas in their time of need.” At least, that’s what the letter all three signed to President Obama on Aug. 14 said. The letter, which sought a disaster declaration for the state in response to its floods, came from all six Louisiana members of Congress and its two senators. Obama issued the declaration that very day.

Fleming, Scalise and Cassidy, by the way, are also climate change deniers, a sign that they’re unable to process evidence in front of their own eyes. Fleming has claimed that evidence of climate change is the product of a “radical environmental agenda.” Scalise has griped that it’s an effort by radicals “to prop up wave after wave of job-killing regulations that are leading to skyrocketing food and energy costs.” Cassidy in 2014 claimed that global temperatures had not risen in 15 years, which happened to be untrue. Remarkably, both Fleming and Cassidy are medical doctors.

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Scalise and Cassidy said their objection actually had been that the House had failed to offset the Sandy appropriation with federal budget cutbacks elsewhere. “Paying for disasters and being fiscally responsible are not mutually exclusive,” Scalise said at the time. But they almost certainly knew that their proposed offsets were sure bill-killers: They would have eliminated mass transit subsidies for federal workers and certain agricultural subsidies, among other things. When an amendment to require those offsets was voted down, Scalise, Cassidy and Fleming rejected the $50.5-billion total, including the initial $17-billion piece.

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http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-louisiana-floods-20160822-snap-story.html

[anoNY42]

1. "“Paying for disasters and being fiscally responsible are not mutually exclusive,” "

Let the feds cut back federal road funding for LA in the same dollar amount that they disburse in flood aid...