| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Politix |
| The Shine Is Off The Lieberman |
| 2005-11-15 |
| Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman continues to wage a recklessly self-interested behind-the-scenes battle to allow the federal government to keep distributing anti-terror funding as political pork rather than according to the risk of attack. For the sake of a few guaranteed bucks for the voters at home, Lieberman is determined to deprive millions of people in New York - and in Washington and in Chicago and elsewhere that Al Qaeda might actually target - of a full share of protection. How can he sleep at night? It is largely because of Lieberman, ranking Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, that the Senate has stalled sending a reauthorization of the Patriot Act to a conference committee with the House. The House version of the legislation would slash pork-barrel spending by ending every state's right to claim .75% of homeland security money, whether or not the money is needed. That fixed funding formula is why states like Wyoming and Alaska have been rolling in anti-terror money while New York has been forced to dig into its own pocket for $1 million a week in police overtime to protect the subways. The formula is also why radios for first-responders in small-state Connecticut are fully compatible, while the NYPD and FDNY still have radios that can't talk to each other. The House version of the new Patriot Act would limit states to automatically receiving only .25% of the annual security grants and allocate the rest based on threat, as urged by the 9/11 commission. The Senate would guarantee each state .55% of the money. That's far too much, but Lieberman wants to keep it that way. He's doing a great disservice to the 60,000 Connecticut residents who commute to work in the city - and he is likely shortchanging his own state by trying to keep money flowing to the boondocks. As New York's neighbor, Connecticut lives in the shadow of attack and has a number of targets of potential interest to terrorists. The state, for example, is home to the Coast Guard Academy in New London and to the Navy's nuclear submarine pens and the Electric Boat shipyard in Groton. Connecticut also has 98 miles of the nation's most important highway, I-95, and busiest passenger rail corridor. Lieberman should be fighting to get Connecticut - and New York - as much money as they deserve based on threat instead of trying to funnel cash everywhere it's needed least. So, Joe, you really like pork, huh? |
| Posted by:.com |
| #3 Thanks, .com. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2005-11-15 21:34 |
| #2 Oops, sorry, Pappy. Here it is. |
| Posted by: .com 2005-11-15 11:36 |
| #1 Link for this? |
| Posted by: Pappy 2005-11-15 11:19 |